Minecraft Stories
by XandricTheBeater
Summary: A compilation of oneshots that my friends wrote and had me post them on FanFiction.
1. 100 Days To Mine PT1

Minecraft stories

HELLO! THIS IS JLWAFFLEZMAN HERE WITH A NEW EXCITING STORY! THIS WILL BE A SERIES OF ONESHOTS ABOUT MINECRAFT THAT I GOT FROM MY FRIENDS. WE ALL PITCHED IN TO WRITE THESE AND SINCE I HAD A FANFICTION ACCOUNT, WE DECIDED THAT I WOULD POST THEM. UPDATES WILL BE AT RANDOM WHENEVER I GET A NEW STORY THAT IS GOOD. THERE MAY BE A FEW GRAMMAR PROBLEMS DUE TO MICRSOFT WORD. BTW THE FILE IS TO BIG FOR THE WHOLE STORY TO BE POSTED SO I WILL BE POSTING IT IN 2 PARTS.  
>100 Days To Mine By: Zuned1<br>Chapter 1: An abrupt landing

For me, it was going to be an average day. I was going to go Christmas shopping for my family, last-minute, like usual. But wouldn't you know, it wasn't meant to be.  
>I suppose I should start with myself. My name's Alex, and I'm 14 years old. I'm your typical teenager, with girl problems, school, and all that other crap. Well, that's all you'll need to know about me...<p>

I was driving on the highway, doing 65. I knew I was speeding, but seeing as to how I was 14, that didn't seem to trouble me. I was doing at least 3 illegal things right now. I was in my mom's car, a Lexus RX330. It was old, but it wouldn't draw attention to me. I was enjoying driving, but I knew I had to be careful. I would catch Hell if I got caught. Little did I know, that was gonna be the least of my problems.

I was moving from one lane to the other, trying to weave through traffic to get to the next offramp. But sadly, some idiot that really shouldn't have been driving decided to ram right into the side of me. I swerved out of control, my head spinning, and crashed into the barrier separating the two sides of the highway. Everything went black.

I awoke once more, still in the car, in pain, crying, with blood splattered everywhere. Then I realized, with what little strength I had left. It was my blood. At that thought, I blacked out once more. This time, I wasn't going to wake up in that wretched car.

~~~~~

I awoke once more to a falling sensation. I felt wind whipping past my hair, whooshing in my ear. I slowly opened my eyes and realized with a snap that I was falling. I quickly became awake and looked around. I could see ground, closing in fast. There was a small puddle of water, and using some tricks I'd learned from watching movies that had people skydiving, I aimed to the pool. I splashed down, and for the third time, blacked out. It was beginning to get very irritating.  
>I awoke in this strange land, with no explanation as to how I got here, what this place was, or simply where I was. I looked at my surroundings. I could see a few trees around me, the small pond that had saved my life, a couple of rolling hills, and a cave, along with a few mountains in the distance. I walked around this place, thinking that I was alone. I found this untrue when the oinking of a pig nearly gave me a heart attack. I turned and saw it simply standing there, staring at me with a confused, blank expression. It wondered what I was, no doubt.<p>

I slowly approached it, and tried to pet it. When I found that it liked me, I gave it a hug. "I'll name you... Randy!" I said. The pig oinked with approval. Approval of what, I didn't know; I simply didn't care enough. I wandered around some more, and decided that my lack of shelter was unacceptable. I was worried, at that time, that I would get rained on, something I hated, or that I would need shelter from the Sun, but I had no idea what that shelter was actually going to protect me from.

Chapter 2: My night alone.

I used my bare hands to break some of the sticks off of trees, and found that the sticks we're rather hard. I knew that if I wanted the thick log that made the base of the tree, I would need tools, preferably stone tools. I made a crude pick out of my sticks and hiked to the mountain. I dug some stone out of the side, and made my simple stone axe. It was terrible, and wouldn't last, but I didn't care. I was hoping I wouldn't need it long. I walked back to my chosen clearing, and chopped down the hard logs of the trees. It was nearing sundown when I finished. I made the logs I'd collected into some planks, and set out to build my shelter. I used a tree I'd left alive as a base. I realized I would need a door, but knew I couldn't use my hands to make it. Instead, I fashioned a workbench with some tools and a work area out of some of the spare stone and wood in my pack. I quickly fashioned a door, and placed it in my chosen doorframe.  
>However, I realized that I'd forgotten something important: Light. I had no source of light. While I probably wouldn't need it, it would make navigating at night easier. So at the crack of sundown, I dropped all my stuff but my wood pick and ran to the mountain fast as I could. I had no idea the dangers that would lurk all around, but the darkness alone made me run. So I ran to the mountain and looked around for something flammable. I struck a load of luck and found some coal. I quickly mined a few chunks of it, and headed home. I ran once more, but night struck before I could get inside. I slowed down a little, and tried to stay calm, but it was a futile attempt. From seemingly nowhere, a skeleton appeared from behind a tree. It was unexplained: it had simply appeared and then come out. I cautiously walked by it, hoping that it wasn't aggressive, when it suddenly pulled on a bow on me. I saw it try to notch an arrow, and knew that this was not good. I started sprinting, but it didn't save me from the arrows. While none of them hit me, I was forced to duck this way and that, to dodge the rain of fire. It seemed like a bit much for one skeleton to be firing; I looked around and saw dozens more, firing at me. I turned behind me and saw more, in addition to something just as chilling.<p>

I saw zombies, hurrying behind me, groaning and moaning and looking generally unkind. I found my house, which I almost missed because of the darkness, and quickly opened the door and ran inside. However, I was greeted by an unfriendly face; it was green and distorted, and the creature that the face belonged to was no sight for sore eyes. It was a hideous, infected green body, with four equally creepy legs. I started slapping it to the best of my sad abilities. It wasn't having an effect, so I simply opened my door and ran outside.

The creature, which I named a 'creeper', for the fact that it's creepy, followed me out. It started hissing, and so I ran. But after a mere second, I felt an explosion behind me, and was thrown by a sudden hot force into a tree. To add to my irritation, I blacked out.

Chapter 3: The method of rebirth.

Everything was black and calm. I wondered if I had truly died this time. My answer was soon given to me. It was No.  
>A hole in the ground spontaneously opened up, and I was thrown out of it by an unknown force. Instead of it being nighttime in this strange world, it was once again daytime. I was wondering if this was the world I was previously in, and thought that it probably was. I soon spotted my old plank house, and knew at that moment that I was indeed still in this world. I walked over, and as I was walking, I fell into a random crater. I tried to remember what had happened the night before, and it hit me like a tree. And I would know what that feels like. Either way, that creeper, as I call them, had exploded behind me. It created this crater and killed me by throwing me into a tree. I saw dirt lying around, and figured it would be helpful later on. I put it into my sack and climbed out.<p>

I covered the hole with some of my dirt, so I wouldn't fall in again, and walked into my house. I saw a few things lying around, and some things I could tell were missing. My pick, axe, some of my sticks, and half of my planks were still there. I found my coal lying outside. My tree sapling and cobblestone was missing. I took no mind of it and made some torches, hoping the light would scare them off. I hoped it would, ever so dearly. But looking at the sun, I knew that the day was still young. I ventured outside to collect more resources. I took my daily hike to the mine, and on my way chopped some trees, planting new ones all around. I approached the mountain and began to mine. After mining for a little, I encountered a strange ore. It had a brownish-orange tint to it, and appeared hard. My weak wooden pick would not suffice to mine it, whatever it was.

I took the wooden head off the pick, and replaced it with a harder stone one. I began to mine the strange material, and took some of it home with me that night. When I arrived home, I remembered last night's episode, and decided that I didn't want a repeat. So I built an underground shelter. It was a simple staircase in my house leading downward into a larger room that was safe from monsters aboveground. I built a furnace and placed it in the corner. I placed my spare workbench in another corner. In the time I had from night, I built a chest for my valuables. I stored some items in it. I stored a bundle of sticks, a bundle of planks, and my spare wooden pick head. It wasn't full right now, but I knew it soon would be.

As it got later, I grew tired after my busy day of work. I fashioned a bed of dirt, which I knew I would have to replace, and got on it. I began drifting into a sleep with thoughts of the day's activities in my head. I was almost asleep when I awoke to a loud noise. I was too asleep to realize what it was, but I was awake, and became more alert. I got up and brushed some dirt off, then went up to my bunker entrance to see what had caused the noise. I looked through the tiny window on my door, but didn't see anything. I went downstairs to resume my sleep, but I grabbed my axe just in case I need protection. I was about to get back in bed when I heard the noise again. This time I was awake enough to tell what it was; there was a girl somewhere nearby, screaming. I panicked at first, not knowing what to do. Should I help the girl, or was it some unknown monster attempting to lure me out? Would I make it back alive, or go through the painstaking process of rebirth-through-dirt hole again? If there was a girl and I did rescue her, would she be hot? Would she like me?

I chose to ignore every instinct telling me to stay and let the noises live their own life, and followed the one instinct that told me to go and risk my life.

I followed the continual screams, through the forest. I climbed a tree and hopped on top of them, where the monsters didn't see me and the view was much larger. I followed the screaming for 2 or 3 minutes, and then found the source. There was in fact a girl, and she was running from the monsters. I followed her, until she got backed into a corner with no path to keep going. The monsters closed in on her, and she would have died, had I not intervened. I jumped from the treetop and cut a good 3 zombies on my landing. I reared my axe once more, to strike again, and swung with all my might. It wasn't much, but it got the last zombie. I saw more monsters approaching us, and I grabbed the girl's hand and ran forward, pulling her behind me. Her hand was soft, and warm, the only kind thing about this world that we were lost in. We ran as fast as we could, and made it back to my small bunker alive. I opened the door and pushed her in, then closed it behind me. I took her downstairs, and sat her down on a pile of dirt I called a chair.

She simply sat there, with a look of disbelief in her green eyes. Her cheeks were red from exhaustion, a bead of sweat dripping down her forehead. Her long, brown hair had been messed up while we were running, but it still looked beautiful. I looked at what she was wearing; a t-shirt and a skirt. Her skirt was ripped, along with a few small rips on her shirt, and there was dirt all over her clothes. I gave her a moment to calm down, then asked her a simple question. "Hey, calm down, there's no more monsters. Calm down," I said. She began to breathe regularly once more, and her heart had stopped pumping. She sat calmly, thinking about what had happened. I asked, "What's your name?" But she simply looked at me with a distressed face, and ignored me. She got up and sat in one of the corners and started crying, quietly. I watched her for a few moments, then offered her my bed. She didn't reply, just simply got up and lay down on my bed. I lay on the hard, cold floor and thought about what had just happened. Had I made a new friend, an ally to aid me in my survival, or would she abandon me? I slowly fell asleep with questions buzzing in my head.

Chapter 4: Her Hysterical Hysteria.

I awoke to the sound of footsteps. I almost freaked out, for fear that a monster had gotten into my base, but soon remembered my eventful night. I got up off the hard floor and looked for that girl. I still didn't know her name... I heard the sound of a pick hitting a rock. I knew that sound anywhere. I looked in my room, but didn't see her. Then I noticed a new hole in the wall. I ventured through it, to see if perhaps the little troublemaker had gone mining. Wouldn't ya have it, she had. She was digging a room, a simply ten by ten room. I asked her simply, "What're you doing?" She replied simply, "Making my own room," at which I turned at went to make myself some breakfast. Although on the way out, I snuck a smile.  
>I went outside and killed a pig, then said a simple apology I prepared for any animals that died to keep me alive. I found it the right thing to do. Then, I walked back inside, to see if my little friend wanted some bacon, or needed help. When I got in, she was crying. I felt bad for her and all, but she was becoming a pain.<p>

I sat down next to her, and started rubbing her back softly. She sat there, crying into her hands. After a few minutes of me rubbing her and her crying, she abruptly got up, and charged out of the unfinished room, and began making a lot of noise. I followed her out to find her destroying my dirt bed, messing up my toolbox, ruining my furnace, and throwing the things in my chest all over the place. I started panicking and tried to save as many things as I could. I then followed her up and out of the bunker, to find the small wood hut on fire. I ran outside and started trying to put it out, but it was no use. I simply looked at her, and she was just sitting there again, crying. She was driving me nuts.

I sat down next to her, and tried to soothe her. "Come on, calm down. Please? Stop crying? Come on." I kept saying. Then she went berserk. "What're you talking about? Calm down? Calm down? How the hell can I calm down! I was in my house, sleeping, when I woke up in this hell! And then I get attacked by zombies, and skeletons, and spiders, and little explosive things! How the hell am I supposed to calm down!" She screamed. Obviously, she wasn't taking this nearly as well as I had.

I got up and stood next to her, and grabbed her by the shoulders. She wasn't taking me being nice very well, so I was gonna have to rule with an iron fist, instead of a heart of gold. "Listen. And listen well. I saved you out in that forest because you don't deserve to die. I saved you because you were worth saving. But ever since we got here, you've been crying. You've sat down and cried. And recently, you went and destroyed my supply stash. And, you carved out half a room and left it there. I'm giving you two options. You can stop your crying, and help me survive, or I can kick you out back into the wild and watch you from the safety of my bunker. Now, which do you prefer?" She simply stood there, dumbstruck, a tear still mid-roll down her cheek. "I'm gonna give you 10 minutes to choose. So hurry up." And then I went into my house, and lay down on my bed. It felt good, after venting a little, and after that hard night on the floor. I sat for 5 minutes, when the girl came down. She wasn't crying, but her eyes were still red and puffy. She simply picked up a pick and started finishing her room. I sat and watched, watching her work. She was obviously a girlie-girl, you could tell from her clothes. But she seemed to have a tomboy side, as well. She was certainly strong, athletic, but proud and dignified. When she came out of her completed room, she simply said, "And my name is Julia." Then vanished into the confines of her room.

I fixed the majority of my room from her little episode, and went over to her room. I knocked on her doorframe, which was still empty, and walked in. "Hey. You all done crying?" I said. "Yeah. But that doesn't mean I'm not still upset. I mean, it's sort of nice here, but I just want to go home, to my real bed, with my family, and just curl up and go to bed, without worrying about monsters outside our door." I listened to her, and sat by her side. "Well, there's two of us now. And one of us can sure kick-ass." I said, happily. She blushed a little, then I got up to go to bed in my room. She silently giggled, but I didn't notice. I was just happy what happened had happened.

Chapter 5: One more unstable friend...

Life out here, in the middle of nowhere, was growing into a simple routine. Every day, me and Julia would go out and gather resources such as dirt, coal, and stone, and we always restocked on wood. I did most of the work while Julia carried most of the materials back and forth. Together, we made a great team.  
>Our long term survival was mostly guaranteed, as long as not too much changed. But seeing as to how this was a rather spiteful world, and it always seemed to shake things up, my thinking that at the time was pretty much me jinxing us both. Our problems reignited when we got a new visitor. It began when me and Julia were going on a stone mining trip. It was getting dark out, so we filled our packs with all the stone we'd collected and headed home. We'd found some Redstone on an earlier mining trip, and hooked up a few Redstone torches to the house so we'd know when someone was inside. It was to scare off the monsters when they were near us. Otherwise, our house was hidden. But we came back and saw that the light was on, which was curious, seeing as to how the only two people in this world was us. We grew nervous at the thought of someone else in our house.<p>

We slowly approached, and I drew a makeshift wooden sword I'd made the third night we were here. I quietly opened the door, and walked downstairs. Julia followed, a simple stick in her hand. We entered the main bunker part of our house. I saw a figure going through our chest, and decided to put on a brave act for Julia. "Hey! You! Get out of our chest and turn around!" I demanded. The figure stop shuffling through it and turned his head slightly, so he could see us. Then he got up and turned around entirely. I drew my sword to a defensive position, but lowered it slightly when I saw that it was just another human. "Hey! Sorry 'bout going through your stuff. I thought the place was abandoned. So who lives here, just you two?" He questioned. I told him that I lived here, and Julia had moved in a day later. At the mention of Julia, he slightly raised his eyebrow, and grew a little half-smile. He walked forward and pushed me to the side. Up close, I could figure out most of his info. He was slightly taller than me, with blonde, long hair that had that 'flow' to it. He was muscular, more than me by a bit. He had a slight tan. I figured that he was 15, maybe 16. A year or two older than us.

"What the heck's your name, anyway?" I interrogated. He calmly replied, "John." Then he started to act all 'cool' for Julia, obviously trying to flirt with her. He used a few crappy pickup lines, but then he screwed up. "So, you got a phone number?" He asked Julia. I simply stared at her, and then we both broke out laughing rather hard. "Are you kidding me?" I said. "Do you realize where we are?" Julia asked, laughing as she spoke. John realized his error, and simply hung his head. He looked at me and asked me, "So, you got a room I could borrow? This is a nice place." I explained that my house was originally only for me, and we had to make it a split hallway at the entrance to give me and Julia our privacy. I also told him how Julia and I had carved out our own rooms. I pointed to a place in the wall I'd be meaning to mine for a few days. "Start digging here. Go about 3 meters, then on the fourth meter, start building your room. Only three blocks high, otherwise the monsters will start noticing you, even underground. And we don't need a breach in this secure facility." And then I reached into my pack and tossed him a stone pick. "Better get started." I told him. Julia came over, and saw John holding the pick. He appeared confused, probably wondering, 'Why am I working,' or 'Who is this kid to think he can boss me around?' But Julia simply laughed at him. "Come on, he's got some work to do." I motioned for her to go to sleep for tomorrow. I soon fell asleep to the sound of a pick hitting rock, and zombies groaning from the above side.

Chapter 6: A Christmas Miracle.

I awoke in my bed, fully rested. I got up and slowly grew awake. When I was ready, I headed for Julia's room. We we're going to go on a mining trip today. I went over to make sure she was ready, and sure enough, she was. She was sitting in her room, playing with some sticks from when we'd first arrived. I asked her if she was ready, and she said she was. We checked our supplies. We had our picks, some spare food, a sword for defense, and a sack to carry the ore we collected. So we headed out, hoping to come back with something.  
>We journeyed first to the mountain, where the cave was. I asked her if she was ready, and she nodded agreement. Slowly, we headed down into the dark, deep abyss we called a cave. We placed torches here and there, lighting up the place. We slowly descended, collecting any iron or coal we saw along the way.<p>

Soon, the caves began to grow warm. When the cave stopped inclining, we saw it; before us was a massive lake, filled with lava. I looked around. I told Julia to stand back, for fear of her safety. I checked my watch to see what time it was, and figured we had about 10 hours to mine our stuff and get back up. Then I noticed the date. My watch said it was the 24 of December, the day before Christmas. I knew I liked Julia, and thought this was an opportunity to impress her. I knew I had to get her something, somehow. I looked around the lava lake to see what might lie in wait, but didn't spot anything. Then, out of the corner of my eye, I saw a glint. I looked, and saw a massive iron vein. That didn't impress me; what did was that I could see a small amount of diamond near it, along with what appeared to be gold. So I told Julia that I was going to go get the iron, which in reality was the diamonds and gold. I built the bridge, and soon made it across. I began to mine the gold and diamonds. I thought about what this would be good for, and decided to make Julia a necklace. I mined all the iron as well, just so I would've seemed legitimate, and decided to head back. I started to cross the bridge when I heard a moan. A moan that could've only belonged to one thing; a zombie. I turned just in time to see a zombie pouncing on me. I cut off its arm, which made a sick sound as the rotting flesh ripped. I took another strike at the zombie, getting his other arm. I reared for another strike, but before I knew it, the zombie had pinned me to the ground. It had done so with such force that all the wind was knocked out of me. The now armless zombie tried to eat my face. I fought back, but the zombie managed to get my cheek. I winced at the pain, and he managed to get another blow on my shoulder. I reached for my sword, near the zombie's lower torso, but the zombie kicked it into the lava. As it burned, I knew that that would be this zombie's fate. I pushed him off me with one burst of strength, and then threw him off the bridge. He burned slowly in the magma.

I continued down the bridge, making my way back to Julia. When I saw her face, it was distorted with fear, with horror. I could tell why; she'd nearly watched the only true companion she had here burn in a pit of magma, a not so pleasant thought. I hugged her and said some soothing things to calm her down. I checked my sack for the items, and saw they were there. I wrapped my arms around her comfortingly, when she said she was scared. So I told her to come back to the surface. We both went up, Julia slightly traumatized. We got back to the house safely. I took Julia to her bed, and told her to lay down. I let her go to sleep after the traumatizing events that had taken place.

When she fell asleep, I began my project. I selected the largest diamond, and shaped it. When it was done, it resembled a somewhat flattened grape. I had melted some gold into a case for it. I put the diamond into the gold casing, and it fit perfectly. I then attached an iron chain to it. Looking back, it seems to have been done fast, but in reality, it had taken a good few hours. I then fashioned a jewelry box out of some planks and wool. I snuck into Julia's room and placed it on the table, where she would notice it. I then snuck out. As I passed John's room, he signaled for me to come in. He said plainly, "Even if she likes the gift, she's gonna go for me. I'll make sure of it. Now get out."

I went to my room, and sat down. I was going to go to bed when Julia walked in. She asked me, "What in the world is this?"  
>"Well, it's a present for you. Today's Christmas day! Merry Christmas!"<br>Julia was momentarily stunned. She thought, and then realized that it was in fact Christmas. "Oh, thank you Alex! But, I can' take this. I don't have anything for you."  
>"It's okay. Just open the present, I think you'll like it!"<br>"I'll open the present, but I have to give you a present sometime! I'll feel guilty if I don't."  
>"Okay, but hurry and open the present!" And she did. She took the lid off the wooden box, and looked the contents. Then, her jaw dropped, and she simply stuttered with her words while trying to describe it. "Why, Alex! It's so beautiful! Where the heck did you get this!" She asked. I told her the story of how I found diamonds and gold behind the iron ore, before I was attacked. She gave me a big bear hug and kissed me on the cheek. "It's wonderful." She said. "I'm gonna go try it on in my room and think of what to get you. Thanks again!" And she kissed me on the cheek one more time before leaving.<p>

I silently celebrated, think about what had just happened. Then, I noticed John standing in the doorframe. "You may have impressed her, but I'm gonna win this here fight. Just watch and wait." He said. Then he vanished as quickly as he'd come. I took no mind to his warning, but later realized I should've.

Chapter 7: My New Best Frenemy.

I awoke to the sound of music. I had no clue where the music was coming from. I got up and walked around. I followed the music to its source. I found myself in Julia's doorframe. I looked around the room, and saw Julia tinkering with something on the far wall. I stood there and waited for her to notice me. She continued tinkering with the strange box, when she spoke. "I know you're standing there."  
>"I knew you did." I said, walking over to her. "So what's this?"<br>"It's supposed to be your Christmas present. I made it myself, but I'm still working out some.. There we go. Never mind what I was saying." She picked up the box and held it out for me to take. "Merry Belated Christmas!" She said. I took the box, and looked at it. I looked at all the sides, and tried looking into the long, thin hole on the top.  
>"So what the heck is it?" I asked.<br>"It's a jukebox, silly! You put a CD in the top, and it starts playing!" She said.  
>"Okay. It's a jukebox, and a nice one. But where do I get the CD's for it?" I asked. She frowned and thought.<br>"I guess you don't... I got the idea because a creeper that exploded dropped it. I knew it was a CD, so I made a jukebox for you." I laughed at the thought.  
>"Well, I guess it's a good thing you didn't get killed by the creeper." I said. I then heard a footstep behind me, and turned around. John was standing at the door, a bag slung over his shoulder.<br>"Well guys, I'm gonna be going. I hope you get screwed over by a creeper." He said.  
>"Wait, you're leaving?" Me and Julia asked simultaneously.<br>"Yup. I can't say it's nice living here, so I'm gonna find a nicer place. Like I said, hope you get screwed over by a creeper." And he turned for the door. I looked at Julia, who had a puzzled look on her face. Then I ran up to the entrance and watched John leave. Julia came up behind me. "You're not going to make it out there. There's too many monster's!" Julia called. But John simply pat his bag, and said, "I got it all covered. Good to know you care." He said sarcastically. Me and Julia watched him go.  
>I was the first to break the silence. "I hope he gets screwed over by a creeper.." I mumbled.<br>"I'm glad he's gone, but you don't have to be rude." She said, hitting me on the arm. I walked down to my room and sat on my bed. ~I'm glad he's gone. But what he said Christmas night.. Was he serious? Was he gonna fight back somehow?~ I thought. Questions like that popped in and out of my head for a couple minutes, then Julia brought the Jukebox in.  
>"Well, here's you present." She said.<br>"I'm gonna go catch some sleep. Like you, that project kept me up all night." And she went to sleep. I kept thinking about what John had said. ~I'm glad he's gone. Good riddance.~ And tried to nap. After I found I couldn't, I went outside. But when I came up the exit steps, I saw the wooden shelter that indicated the entrance burning. My eyes suddenly grew wide, and I ran outside the hut, dodging a falling piece of wood. I looked at the burning entrance. My eyes were filled with horror.  
>I turned around and saw John on top of a small hill. He was laughing evilly, waving good-bye. He turned and headed down the hill, laughing. I silently cursed him. I sat and let the entrance burn, then set out to rebuild the entrance once the first was out. The only thing going through my head was, ~I guess I have a new best frenemy.~<p>

Chapter 8: Another boatload of people.

I emerged from the simple underground bunker and stretched. "Another fine day in the land of no name." I said. I sat down in a lawn chair I had built. I took out a book I had found and started to read it. As I read, I thought about what had happened with John yesterday. I couldn't get him out of my mind. I hadn't told Julia that the entrance had caught fire, but I think she knew. How, I didn't know, but I knew she did. After reading for a while, Julia came outside and sat in the other lawn chair I'd built. We started talking. I asked her what her life was like back home, and we just talked. We bonded more than we ever had. We stopped talking after a while and started enjoying the beauty of the world we we're in. I broke the silence. "This is the perfect world. So fine, so wonderful, and joyous. And with monsters, certainly thrilling." She laughed at the last part. She brushed some hair out of her face. "Alex... I've really enjoyed being here. Being with you. And... I just want to tell you tha-" But she was cut off. In the distance, there was a giant plume of fire. It caused the earth to shake, and it made a large boom. Me and Julia got up and started running towards the source of the event. We knew we were close when there was a large circle of dirt, a crater, and a lack of trees. We looked into the deepest part of the crater, and saw a mob of people. Me and Julia just stared at the mob. They were all panicking and running around and screaming. Then, they suddenly grew silent, and stared up at the sky curiously. I ran down into the crater a little, and Julia followed. Then I shouted, "Hey! Over here! Look at me!" And Julia joined in. Once we got their attention, we told them to be quiet. "Look," I said, "You may not know where you are, or why you're here, but please be calm! You're in..." I looked at Julia, and mouthed the words, 'What do we call this place?' She mouthed back, 'Name it whatever you want.' So I shouted to the crowd, "This place is called Julans!" I looked at Julia and smiled, and she just laughed and hid her face in her hands, playfully. I turned back to the crowd and shouted, "Me and my friend, Julia," and I saw some of the guys or girls our age snicker, "Have been here for around 3 weeks now! We have a small home, but we believe that with your help, we could create a great empire!" And then, I saw a small explosion, and heard someone shout, "Or, you could come with me!" I looked. It was John. "First, I'd like to know. How come so many of you suddenly came?" One man in the crowd stood on a rock, a head and shoulder above the rest. "We we're all on a cruise. We saw a meteor, headed straight for us. We all braced for the impact, when it hit. There was a huge explosion, but none of us were hurt. When the smoke subsided, we were here."  
>I got the next word. "Look, I'm not one for trouble, so I'm gonna let you guys pick. Come with us, the experienced, supplied kids, or the evil, unprepared one." I knew it was harsh. But then murmurs started in the crowd, and everyone started moving. Some people came to our side of the crater, but an equal amount went to John. I realized something: We we're almost like the kings of our own cities. I turned to my people, my new people. There were around 50 or 60 of them. "Come. I will gather my supply of stone, and we shall build!" The crowd shouted with joy. Me and Julia led them to our small house, and I got out our wood supply. I quickly made a small table, and everyone crowded around it. I started drawing on the map, planning out the walls and the city as a whole. We would have 7 people go mining for a stone supply, as well as gather coals, 5 people would be chopping down wood, 10 would be building the wall, and the rest would be landscaping or building houses and whatnot. At night, we had a small wall up, one that the monsters wouldn't be able to get over. We had roughly 5 houses built, and we roomed everybody in them. Me and Julia stayed in our underground bunker. We had built a small wall, 1 meter high, to announce the boundaries of our soon to be castle. It was slightly larger than our underground bunker, which would soon become the basement of our castle.<p>

Julia came into my room. She sat next to me on my bed. "You know... That was great, what you did out there. That really was amazing. But do you really want to take on this responsibility? You want to be a king, to manage all those people?"  
>I thought about it. I put my arm around Julia and said plainly, "Yes."<br>She smiled, and said, "Good. But don't forget about me. I'll always be here, and that won't change."  
>I smiled and laughed. I kissed her on the cheek. "I won't. Now let's get some sleep. We've got a big week coming up."<br>Julia smiled and left. I laid down and went to bed. In my dreams, he kept seeing this one scene... It was John, in the middle of a burning kingdom. He stood and laughed, holding a sword. Then, he struck down and stabbed a figure in the chest. Then he laughed to the heavens, and said, "I said I would get my revenge!" Thinking back on the dream, I realized that the figure had been me. I was nervous. I wondered if John really would attack our kingdom... As I slept, I prayed that he wouldn't.

Chapter 9: The note that changed it all.

It was a week from when the kingdom was started. I hadn't seen eye nor ear of John, but I knew he was busy. Meanwhile, so had we. We'd had a birth in the week, which made us build a hospital. We'd built a school for the kids until they were 13. We'd added a tavern, sold multiple lots to raise money, using our new money system, and watched a building company get started, watched a public mine get dug, and watched the slow progress of our castle. All around us, the wall was growing taller. By the end of the week, the city was mostly complete. We had a wall, a gate, a populous, and a money system based on the refining of gold into gold coins. If you found gold, you had 3 to 5 gold coins on your hands.  
>Me and Julia were proud of ourselves, and of our people. The castle we stood in was nothing much, quite modest actually. The basement remained our rooms, simply because remodeling would waste time. So the first floor was the throne room, the second held our wonderful indoor hot tub, and split down the middle, the other side held our storage facility, and the third was the kitchen on one side, and the other was the dinner hall. But it had a balcony with a wonderful view of the whole city. Me and Julia were on the balcony, talking. The wind up here caused her hair to blow with it. She looked beautiful. I put my arm around her, and got closer. We stood up there for a few minutes. Then I turned to face her. "Julia, I've loved having you around these past few weeks. But.. I'm leaving in a few hours." Her smiling face dissolved, replaced by a frown. "Why?" she asked. I told her that I wanted to go back to the mine where I'd almost been killed. "That's crazy! It'd be suicide! If you're going, I'm coming too!" And so I went downstairs, and got ready. When Julia was ready too, we headed out for the mine. Before I left, I appointed my temporary replacement. He was a 40-year-old man, but he was qualified and everybody seemed to like him. So he got the job.<p>

I slowly approached the mine, nervous because of what had happened last time. Julia squeezed my arm. "Do we have to do this? Why are we back here anyway?" I told her that I'd gotten a dream two days ago. It was of an apocalypse, one that would have to be prevented. I told her that the image of an hourglass kept popping into my head during the dream, and that it appeared to be where I'd fought off the zombie. So she begrudgingly agreed, and we went down into the mine. We soon came to the underground lava lake. Sure enough, I was right. The middle of my bridge had been removed, this gold and glass hourglass replacing it. I walked over to it, and saw a book on the ground.

It read, 'I have created this world, in hopes that I can stay in peace. I do not wish to be visited by anyone. Should my location, this fine lava lake, be compromised, this hourglass will start to tick. There is enough sand in it to last 100 Days.' I showed the entry to Julia. I flipped the page and read on. 'Today, I believe I've been compromised. I saw a boy wash up on the shore. I heard him talking, and his name is Alex. Later, a girl came. The two of them visited my cave... I believe that he has started the Hourglass. I hope he enjoys his time here, because when this place blows, I won't be around to watch.' I flipped through the pages, reading about my own adventures. On the last page, I saw some useful information, that would save our lives, if not doom us. 'I have studied the hourglass, and it is almost 2/5 empty. This is good news, but bad for poor old Alex and co. It has only been around 20 days since the boy arrived, which means that he only has 30 days left to survive. Then I can start a new world. Hopefully, he doesn't figure out how to stop the apocalypse.' I closed the book and looked at Julia. We both had a look of disbelief on our face. It would've been funny, but seeing as to how we had 30 days to live, it really wasn't. They began the trek up the mine, remaining in disbelief.

When they arrived at the castle, they immediately went to their rooms. Alex stored the book in his chest that was hidden under his bed. He didn't want word of this out yet. He suddenly yearned for a hot bat, having not taken one in weeks. He went up to the second floor, wearing only his underwear. He'd also brought a towel. He walked through the door to the hot tub, but stopped dead in his tracks. Julia was already in the hot tub, in a bikini. He figured he had three options: the first was simply to leave. The second was to try to pull a move on her, a rather extreme one at that, involving bikini straps. The third option was to get in the hot tub with her. He found the 1st one stupid, the 2nd one was inappropriate at this point, but the third was just fine. So he slipped into the hot tub with her.

I got in the hot tub with her. When she heard the water splash, she opened her eyes to see who it was.  
>"Oh! Alex! Gosh, you scared me, I thought you were someone else. And that would've been embarrassing." She said.<br>"Sorry, I just felt like taking a hot bath. So, I got in with you. You don't mind, do you?" I asked. I felt like an idiot at that point.  
>"No, I kinda like it. It was getting sort of boring." She said, smiling. I scooted closer to her, and put my arm around her. She leaned her head on me. "Are you worried?" She asked. "About the whole apocalypse?"<br>"I don't know. Part of me says it's true, and to worry, but part of me says, 'Yes, sweet relief from this stressful life!' But then there's part of me that wants to simply stay here and not worry." I started stroking her hair. "I dunno. Are you nervous?"  
>She looked up at me and said calmly, "No." I looked at her curiously. She understood what I meant. "Well, I don't really care, in all honesty. I'm gonna be here, and I'll have lived one of every girl's dreams in a matter of 50 days. I'll become a princess, with a kingdom, and a castle, and all the fun parts of being a princess."<br>I looked down at her, and she looked up. She sat up straight next to me and said, "And I even have a Prince Charming."  
>We looked into each other's eyes. I leaned in, and she did too. We sat there, in that hot tub, kissing. We kissed, and kissed some more. Then we sat there, cuddling each other, waiting for the apocalypse that we were going to stop. But we didn't care, because whatever happened, we were going to stop it together.<p>

Chapter 10: The Word gets out.

Me and Julia were in the hot tub together again. After the first time, it became a simple habit. We'd been there for around an hour, so I decided to go get dressed. Julia stayed in the hot tub. I went down to my room. I opened my clothes chest, and got dressed. I sat down on my bed, and remembered something. 3 days ago, I'd gotten the book. There didn't appear to be anyone that actually wrote in it, the writing seemed to appear. And apparently I was right; there was another page in the book. I grew nervous when I saw it was addressed to me.  
>It read: 'Hello, Alex.<br>I know you've gotten my book. I suppose I should tell you a little something. I'm the one who created this world; my name is Notch. Should you figure out how to stop your coming apocalypse, I request that you seal off the hourglass. There's always the chance a nearby human presence could reset it. Thank you, and enjoy your remaining 27 days.  
>Signed, Notch.'<p>

I sighed at the letter. I had no clue how I was to stop the coming apocalypse. But for some reason, I thought about John's empire. I figured he should know, should we need his help. I wrote a letter explaining the situation, and enclosed the book inside an envelope. I sealed it and went down to the castle yard. I found the nearby gardener and told him I'd pay him 7 coins if he could get my letter to John. And the gardener went on his way. As he left, I went back to the castle. I went to the second floor, where Julia still was. She turned and saw me coming. "Where'd you go?" She asked. I told her about the book and my thoughts that John would need to know. "Okay. But Alex... How are you gonna stop the world from somehow being destroyed? We don't even know how it will be destroyed. We're safe from attacks from the usual monsters, lava, water, and most other events. Why are you stressed?"  
>"Because I get the feeling that it will be in larger quantity than we could expect or prepare for..." I said. Julia got up on the rim of the hot tub. She wrung the water out of her hair, then let it fall. She got up to go get changed. I got up and went to the top floor and looked out the balcony. I could feel the gravity of the situation... Then I heard a banging. I went down to the first floor of the castle and opened the door. Outside, there was a mob. I quickly got them to quiet down, then asked what was wrong. One of the ladies shouted, "You sure as hell know what's wrong! There's and apocalypse coming, and you're not telling us? We should be preparing!" I knew that John would probably tell the gardener that there was an apocalypse coming, but I didn't know how to tell the people myself. So I quieted them down again, and addressed them. "Look. There is an apocalypse coming, and I know it. But I get the feeling that it's gonna have something to do with the unleashing of monsters. I say this because my word is law; any metals or diamonds found are to be placed inside a chest in the forges. I want armor and swords made for everyone, and a shelter made for the children. We will prepare for the coming apocalypse!" At that, Julia ran up behind me. She was wearing jeans and a t-shirt. She figured out what was going on, and whispered in my ear, "Are you sure about this?" I replied, "I sure as hell am." And I walked downstairs and went to bed.<p>

Chapter 11: The Douche Comes Home for the Holidays.

As I emerged from the castle that morning, I noticed something strange. In the distance, there was a low, high-pitched whine. It was barely audible, so I took nothing of it. I simply continued my morning walk. I continued around our small kingdom, looking at what we had accomplished so quickly. I was proud of it. When I finished my walk, I went back To the castle. I went down to my room and checked the book. No new pages. So then I went up to the third floor to get a nice view of things. But what I saw up there shocked me.  
>I saw a man in a cloak standing in the center of the room. In one hand, he held a knife. In the other, he held Julia. He had the knife to her neck. I stopped dead in my tracks and looked at the robed assassin. He wore a mask, but I knew it was John. "You let us go, or I kill the girl." Not wanting a murder, I let the assassin go. I watched from my tower as he headed southward. I was shocked that even John would stoop so low. Without telling anyone, I snuck other of the castle, armed with my sword and arrows. I headed in the direction the assassin did. After a few hours of traveling, I came to his castle. It was day out, and not wanting to be spotted or attacked, I waited in a nearby tree. When it was dark out, I took out the ladder I'd brought. I climb up the wall, then snuck down and headed for his castle. It was a large, tall castle. I knew I was in for trouble if I went in through the front door. So instead, I took my ladder and built one up the side. I was halfway up though, when I ran out of ladder. So I grabbed the moss in-between the cobblestone and climb the rest of the way. I was at the window for the top floor, and listened to the sounds inside. I heard... Snoring? I looked in and saw hammocks around the room, certainly for all the army men. There was only one sleeping, so I snuck past him and went down a floor. It had double doors, made of iron. There was a window at the top of one of them. I listened in, to see what I could hear, and it wasn't pretty. I heard Julia screaming. There was ruffling, and shuffling, like people fighting and fidgeting on a bed. I closed my eyes in pain, simply imagining what could be going on in there. I heard another scream, which was then muffled. I looked up through one window on the door, and saw Julia. The scene that laid before, I knew would haunt me for a good while. Julia was on the bed, her limbs tied to each different corner of the bed. She was obviously struggling, but to no avail. She had been cut off in her last scream by a gag that John had put on her. John was on the bed, kneeling above Julia. She was struggling, but it wasn't helping. John was unbuttoning her shirt, going down the line. I knew I had to time this right, but I didn't want to risk Julia's safety... Or virginity.<p>

~~~~~

I prepared to kick the door down, right as John started unzipping her pants. I kicked down the door, and aimed my bow at John. I knew I could end this, here, now, and fast. But I knew that he would prove a valuable ally. So I planned to let him live. I looked at my surroundings, in case I needed a trick to stay alive. It was a long hallway, elegantly decorated. There were paintings along the walls. Through the center was a long carpet, with gold fringes. Alongside the carpet were columns. The carpet and columns led straight to the bed. John heard the door and stopped frozen. "So. You came to rescue your little princess, did ya? Well guess what. You can't have her." He said, turning his head. He saw me and snickered. "You? You're not going to kill me, Alex. I know it, because you think there's going to be an... apocalypse. But I don't believe your shit. I know there won't, so just relax. And let me kill you fast and easy." He drew a knife from his belt, and jumped off the bed, doing a back flip, throwing the knife, and landing facing me. It was an impressive feat, made more impressive by the fact that even though I ducked, the knife cut my back. I cringed, and John grabbed a sword off the wall and charged at me. I rose up, and drew my sword, throwing my bow and the arrow aside. I started slashing and fighting with John. It was clear that we were equally matched. I'd slash, he'd parry, I'd stumble, he'd take a slash, and I would dodge. It seemed like the fight was more a test of endurance than skill. I backed into a column, and John smiled. He reared back to strike, and stabbed forward, but I was too quick. I rolled onto the other side of the column, where my safety was quickly intruded. He took a slash at me, but I was unprepared for it. He aimed a little too short, so he only cut into my arm. It was a nasty cut, at least 1/2 an inch in, but I would survive. If I survived this. I didn't notice this at the time, but my quiver had been cut off. I quickly got up to ran, but he stabbed my leg. The blade went clean through my leg, giving me a terrible limp at an even worse time. I tried to stand and take a few steps, but fell over. I saw John walking over, taking his time. He was enjoying this. I looked over at Julia, her eyes wide with fear, struggling harder than ever. She was full of anger, and I hated seeing her like that. But seeing it gave me a renewed energy. I struggled, but I got up. John looked at me. "Heh. You thought you could beat me, Alex. You thought that you would get your girl. You thought you could come and stop me. But you were wrong. I have your girl, and she's mine. I've nearly beaten you. You aren't stopping me. And for fun, I'm going to cause you pain. And I'll love it." He said. He stabbed my other leg, then sheathed his sword. I was crying with pain at this point. He walked over to Julia, though, and smiled at her evilly. Her eyes grew wider than ever. She was filled with fear. He started to unzip her pants. I watched in horror. Until I remembered. I had a flashback of when I first entered the room, when he charged me. I'd thrown my bow to the side. I cursed silently when I remembered my quiver was across the room, but silently cheered when I remembered I'd had an arrow in the bow. I pulled my body, dragging myself, to the arrow. I grabbed it and the arrow. I rolled over and sat up as best I could. "John!" I shouted. He turned, just as he was going to take off Julia's shirt. I was furious with him. "Why don't you grab this." I said, letting go of the arrow. That moment seemed to go in slow-mo in my head. 5 things happened at once. The arrow flew through the air, hitting John in his stomach.  
>1. He fell over, unconscious, possibly dead, on one of Julia's arm restraints, and the pressure ripped it.<p>

2. Julia grabbed a knife from John's belt, and cut herself free.

3. She ran over to me, and made sure I was okay. She helped me up and leaned me against a wall.

4. I grew unconscious, saying one last thing to Julia before I blacked out. It was possibly the stupidest thing I could've said. "Julia... Yo.. Your shirt... I.. Is still unbut.. unbuttoned." And I gave a small laugh, then fainted. The pain was simply too much for me to bear.

~~~~~

Hey! It's me, Julia, taking over the storytelling for this bit, seeing as to how Alex practically died on me. Well, when he fainted. I laughed at what he said. It probably was the stupidest thing he could've said, but I found it funny none the less. I buttoned my shirt and zipped up my pants. I'd felt so tortured by that experience, however I wouldn't until we'd gotten home. For now, I had to think of how to get Alex out of here. I knew that we could try to simply walk out. It was late, but there would probably be guards.  
>I thought and thought, but couldn't think of anything. Alex was the one who thought, and lead, I was just a good fighter and everything else. But those skills wouldn't come in handy, or be enough for that matter. I thought, when it occurred to me. I prepared for my plan. I was going to be embarrassed by this, but I knew it was what had to be done. I unbuttoned my shirt again, and unzipped my pants. I don't know why I wasn't quite as disturbed by this as I was when it was John, but I guess it was because this was my own free will. I looked over at John, regretting what I was about to do. Before I picked him up, he spoke. "I don't hate you Julia. But... I knew you'd never love me. That's why I did this. Tell Alex that... That I'm sorry, even though we'll still be enemies." He said the last sentence with a smile. I glared at him and told him, "Shut the hell up. This isn't fun for me."<p>

~~~~~

I ran downstairs, looking like... I hate calling myself this, but a slut. I knew everyone could see my bra, and my thong. It was... embarrassing, to say the least. Downstairs, there were a few guards. I shouted at them. "Hey, come here! Someone... Someone hit John! Help him!" The guards immediately ran over, and they, out of desperation, picked up the table and carried to the town hospital. I snickered. I ran upstairs, to Alex, and picked him up. He was heavier than I expected. "Damnit Alex, you've gotta lose weight.." I carried him out the front door. All the guards were busy being occupied with John, and most townspeople were staying inside their houses because they thought if they went outside they would be killed. I ran out the front gate, easy as pie. Then I started walking back, carrying Alex. He only spoke once, and said 5 words. "Tha... Thanks for n... Not leavin... Me..." And he blacked out for the last time until we got back to the castle.  
>At the castle, I only woke one person. I remembered someone claiming to be a doctor. I ran to their house, and went in. I made sure not to wake the girl on the couch, or his wife. But I woke the doctor, and took him to the castle. There, he took care of Alex. He examined him. He saw that Alex had been hurt, and simply patched him up, doing things that would help him, but I only got to watch part of it. He came to the door and asked for me to come in. I remembered being as scared as hell out there, as scared as I was when John was stripping me down, and when the two had fought. I was relieved when I saw him on the bed. He had bandages, and a sling for his arm. He still wasn't conscious, but he was breathing regularly. I paid the doctor 10 coins, and asked him to not tell anyone what had happened. He agreed. When he left, I talked to Alex, even though he was unconscious. Or so I thought, at the time. That bastard...<p>

~~~~~

It's me, Alex again. Sorry, but my story had been simple at that point. 'I saw blackness.' But when the doctor left, I'd regained consciousness. I opened my eye just a peek, but not so that Julia knew I was conscious. I was too tired at the time to do anything, anyway. I simply laid there, listening to Julia. I remember what she said... Almost perfectly.  
>"Alex... God, I'd been worried. I know you're still unconscious, but... I just want to say that... Well, I love you. You saved me back there. John was... Oh.. I hate him for that... He was going to... To rape me. We both knew it. But then you, you came and saved me. You didn't let him. You took a sacrifice, for me... For us..." And she kissed me on the lips. I didn't react, or she'd know I'd been awake. And I didn't want that. So I let her kiss me. She kissed me, on the lips. I silently cheered, but on the outside remained as staid as I had. I soon fell asleep. Not unconscious, but asleep. I later awoke. I sat up in bed, and tried to stand, but then fell back in pain. I groaned. I remembered my fight, and everything... I looked at my legs, at saw them bandaged. I looked at my arm in the sling. I shook my head in pain, and opened them. To my right, I noticed Julia. I slowly looked at her. "Julia... What... Happened?" I looked at her. She smiled, and hugged me. "Thank god you're okay! Jesus, you had me worried!" I laughed, but it hurt my side. I looked at her, and noticed something. "Julia... You didn't button your shirt, or..." She looked down, and grew an uncomfortable look. I just stared at her, inquisitively. "I.. I had to do it, to get us out of there, and then... I took you back here, but I guess I forgot about it..." She said. "Aren't you going to button it up?" I asked. "Mmm... Nope. I don't care about that right now. All I care about is that you're safe." She said, hugging me. I hugged her back, and then asked if she could leave me to rest. She left, and I fell asleep to the sight of Julia saying she loved someone. Loved me.<p>

Chapter 12: The Mystery, Revealed.

I fell asleep that night to a kind sight, a warming one. But in my dreams, my nightmares, I was plagued. I kept seeing Julia, tied on that bed. John, and arrow through his chest. My limbs, being stabbed. John, attempting to rape my girlfriend. I woke up in a cold sweat. I calmed down a little, before moving. I laid in my bed, realizing before I hurt myself, that it would hurt to stand. So I laid there. I grew bored quickly. My only comfort, my interest, my fun, came from Julia visiting me, sometimes alone, sometimes bringing someone new from the community to meet me. I loved her company, but when she wasn't with me, laying in that bed bored me. I sat, thinking about what there was to do, when thoughts of the apocalypse entered my mind. I thought about John, how he'd called my apocalypse theory, 'shit.' I didn't believe it. But I had to. I rummaged under my mattress, and found the small book. I took it out from under there, and opened it. I examined the last page. There were 2 new entries. The first was from the night I set out. Apparently, Notch was either a god, or truly a great wizard. Alex figured a wizard, from the entry.  
>'Dear Alex,<br>Tonight you've set out for John's castle. But I write this, knowing you won't view it for a few days, in hopes that it aids you in your survival. As I have decided, that if you can get the people to worship me as a god, then I shall assist you. I also point out that your wounds acquired will certainly hinder you during the apocalyptic fight that will come 25 days from when I expect you'd read this.  
>Signed, Notch'<p>

I figured wizard because he admitted that he wished to be worshipped, 'like a god,' not 'as a god.' I decided that I would have to get this done, or he would not tell me the true secret. I read on.

'Dear Alex,  
>I hope you enjoyed Julia's presence. For some reason, you two are destined to not be together. However, I believe that is why you are so close. Well, because I believe in true love, I have chosen to aid you in a few ways. First off, your wounds will heal, during, if not after, the apocalypse. That is one of my 3 gifts. The second gift, is the Ring of Invisibility. However, there is a catch to that one. It must be placed on your hand by one you love. Then, you control the invisibility. However, if you tell anyone what the ring truly is, you will lose it. The third gift, is knowledge of my methods. I wrote a few entries back that I wished that you would die. I now regret saying that. I find your presence here to be highly entertaining, be it watching you attempt to impress Julia, or fighting John, or any other problem. However, I wished that this world would be destroyed, you along with it, so I could start over. It is a long story, but the monsters on this land were created by me. If there was a new world, I could forget about monsters, but I do not believe I could take so many lives. I have cursed this land, but you will have a chance to redeem it. Please, Alex. Save... I don't believe you chose this, but... Julans. Save Julans, for me, for Julia, for everyone. Even John.<br>Signed, Notch.'

I read the note a few times. Sure enough, I was feeling better already. And my arm and legs seemed stronger already. I saw a twinkle in the corner of the room, and on top of my chest, a ring appeared. The Ring of Invisibility. ~Real original name, Notch...~ I thought. Then I thought about the rest of the note. I knew that I would probably already create the new religion, one worshipping Notch, the creator. Simply as repayment. But I knew what was coming. Why there had been so few monsters recently. They were hording for some reason. The monsters that lived in this world, were preparing an attack. I feared that my city would fall. But I knew I had to relax, so I laid back, and napped. I was awoken once, by Julia. She walked into the room, and sat next to me. She started singing, just a nice song in general. I didn't pay attention to the lyrics, but the sound of her voice was beautiful. I fell asleep with a smile upon my face.

Chapter 13: Douche Didn't Die.

I'd thought about it, and from the way Notch had put it, he made John sound alive. The thought troubled me. The man who I'd hit in the stomach with an arrow, the man that had tried to rape my girlfriend. I knew there was always a possibility, when I'd missed his heart, or lung. In the old world.. I thought about the old world, and began longing for it. I thought about how I could get back there, to the place I belong. I knew that it would mean leaving this wondrous world. Leaving my people, my kingdom, Julia. Those thoughts saddened me. I tried to refocus on what I'd been thinking about. I'd thought about how in the old world, he would most likely survive. However, here... He had slim chances. But knowing John, that meant that he would probably survive. I looked at my wounds, and realized how hopeless I was. If I managed to get there, then it would still be impossible to get back, especially if found. But then I realized that in my hopeless state, did I really pose a threat? Could I possibly play ambassador here? Would they hold me a hostage?  
>Those questions and more plagued my mind, as I crawled over to my chest. I grabbed some iron, wood, and wool, and after a great effort, got it to the crafting bench. I started building, cutting wood, threading the wool, and molding the iron. Soon, I had a working wheelchair in front of me. I pulled myself into it, and wheeled myself to the stairs. I managed to use the extra wool to make a rope, and tied the rope to the wheelchair, and the other end to me. I began to climb the stairs, slowly but steadily. I was having such great trouble, seeing as to how I only had one wheel. Eventually, I made it to the top. I wheeled myself out the door, and began my troublesome trek through the hills and woods. It was sunset when I arrived at John's kingdom. I realized that neither of us had named our kingdom. I made a mental note of it. Then I wheeled into the kingdom, the sun setting behind me. I'd just made it.<p>

I wheeled myself to the door of his castle, and knocked. It was opened by a man in robes. "Yes? What do you want?" He spoke in an old, raspy voice. "I wish to see John." I told him. He shook his head and said, "I'm sorry. No one may see John. He is in critical shape. He does not need to be agitated or disturbed right now. Especially by a child." I saw the irony in this, as John was only a year older than me. But when he called me a child, I lost my respect for him. I simply wheeled at him, and he dodged to the side. He sighed, and closed the door.

I wheeled up to the bed John was laying in. I looked at him, his figure, and his condition. His face was twisted in pain, and his breathing was fast paced, but consistent. I asked the nurse tending to him if he would make it. "Right now, it's uncertain. He could go either way. But he shouldn't be disturbed. You may stay with him, but don't wake him." She said, leaving. I closed the door and locked it behind her. I then wheeled back to John. "So, friend. Old friend. You didn't die. I knew you wouldn't. I hoped you wouldn't. You've given me hell, making me a handicap." I simply stared at his weakened form. I heard a chuckle, and realized it came from John. He was awake. "Ya know Alex, I didn't think you'd have the guts to kill me. And you didn't." He gave a pained chuckle. "So what is it. You want to check up on me? Nah. You're probably mad at my amazing abilities. Come to finish the job, then? No? Well. I want to finish it." He said. The smile on his face dissipated into a frown, and he struggled to get up. His whole lower torso had been bandaged. I knew he was weaker than me, but I was a handicap, a cripple. I had one good limb. He hobbled over to the wall, frequently losing his balance, or stumbling. I saw him going for a sword. I thought he would be in worse condition, but obviously not. He grabbed the sword, and made his wa

y back to me. I wheeled to the wall, and grabbed a sword of my own. Mine was slightly smaller, but his was large, and required two hands for him to carry. I tried to cut him, but we we're both terrible at fighting. We each had terrible aim, slower reflexes, and slower speeds. So it was like us fighting in slow-mo, only a bit more boring, but a hell of a lot funnier. I tried to cut his stomach again, thinking if I could hit him, I would get him down, and he would probably die this time. I didn't hit him, though, because I lost my balance and fell out of my wheelchair. John laughed at me, at my sad state. But I think the anger that gave me, combined with a little bit of Notch's healing magic, gave me the strength to endure the pain that came with standing. When I stood, he froze. A look of disbelief formed, then a look of anger. He charged me. It wasn't that fast, so I had time to dodge. When he missed me, he crashed over a small table with a flower pot on it. All of the sudden, I heard a banging on the door. "Let me in! John! You shouldn't be roughing with anyone or anything! John! Open up!" It seemed to be the old man that I had gotten past. I looked back at John, and saw how easily beaten he was. Simply hitting that flower pot had injured him. I almost laughed, until I realized that the same could happen to me. I figured I had to get out, back to my kingdom. I looked out the window, and knew I was at ground level. Using my last bit of strength, I'd picked up my wheelchair and hoisted it out of the window, and climbed out. I got into the wheelchair, and felt instantly relieved. My legs thanked me. I then wheeled out of the kingdom, and back to mine. I looked around, noticing a lack of monsters. This gave me hope. I decided on the kingdom's next big project. And made my way home, planning it out. I got home safely. I wheeled myself into the kingdom, to the castle, and made my way down the stairs, this time leaving the wheelchair at the top. I got myself into bed, and prepared to sleep, when I saw a note on the pillow.

It read:  
>'Alex,<br>I'm SO mad at you right now. Why would you leave, without telling anyone? I freaked out, but I couldn't say because other people would start to flip! Also, how did you get out? Only one of your' limbs is usable.  
>I'm mad at you, Alex.<br>Julia'

I laughed, at how serious she was. Although I knew it was a bad time. She was that serious, and it wasn't a matter to laugh about. I went to bed, thinking about the day. I'd found out John was alive. I'd found out what the apocalypse would consist of. I figured out how to build a wheelchair, which would be personally helpful. And I found out I was healing. ~19 days? Pshaw. I can be ready by then. What have I got to worry about?~ I thought. But, because of that cosmic force in this galaxy, I'd merely jinxed it.

Chapter 14: Broken walls, broken hearts.

Julia had certainly been mad at me. For 3 days now, she's ignored me completely and to the best of her ability. She'd come and get me when it was time for a meal, or if someone needed me, but her face was never a good one when she saw me. It often brought my mood down. And I knew I needed to make amends. But I didn't know how... I let the problem rest, and hoped she would forgive me soon. Thankfully, the town had begun its latest project, and it was helping me keep distracted.  
>The project was simple, yet lengthy. I planned to build a wall. 10 feet thick, 15 feet high, and spanning all the way around the current wall. It would be a great project, so we had every spare hand in the city working on it. Our mine was growing larger, as the stone supply became depleted. I knew that the supply would never truly run out, but the distance to go to retrieve the stone was growing, a bad thing. While I was helping the project, I wasn't completely distracted. I instead thought about Julia more. I would go back and forth between laying the stones and mining, and often times I would see Julia, at the top of the tower. Her hair would be blowing in the breeze that didn't stop up there. She would appear depressed, and bored. She simply watched the going-ones of us, the miners, the villagers, anyone down here. I grew angry at her, sometimes. But I kept working.<p>

That night, I took out the Diary of Notch. I flipped through it, and saw a new entry.

'Alex,  
>I see you're having girlfriend troubles. Well, don't be discouraged. I once had a beautiful wife. She was wonderful, and certainly knew how to entertain a man. But unfortunately, she was killed. We wizards may only be destroyed by human greed; that is to say, in combat. If a mortal kills us, we die, and don't come back. They inherit our powers; our magic, our immortality, but also our weaknesses. They... inherit, part of our personality. If you were to kill me, you would most likely become a hermit, as I had inherited. You would most likely start a diary. You see, you learn a lesson from losing your girl, be it a mere week, or forever, and knowing she can't come back. But Alex, that Invisibility ring... I said you couldn't tell anyone about it. And it looks good, yes? Think about that.<br>Notch'

I realized what he was saying almost immediately. If I gave Julia that ring, which did look awful nice, then she would probably forgive me. And if she figured the invisibility out on her own, then I wasn't telling her. And then the ring wouldn't disappear. I'd loved the idea. So I grabbed the ring, went up to my wheelchair, and wheeled to the top. I slowed down, to be quiet. I wheeled up behind Julia, but then noticed something. Usually, you could see the chain of the necklace I'd made for her with ease, but for some reason, I couldn't see it. I tried to see if there was a bulge in her shirt, but there wasn't. I realized she had taken it off. She hadn't once taken it off since I'd given it to her. I felt saddened by the thought, almost heartbroken. I wheeled out the door, accidentally scraping the stones on accident. Julia heard and saw me leaving, but only a wheel. She didn't make any attempt to follow me. Up there, she had been thinking of what I had done. She hadn't spoke to me, so she didn't know where I'd gone, when I'd left. She reached down to look at the diamond on her necklace. She always felt safe, loved, and always seemed to find an answer in it. As if I had a part of me in it. Neither of us knew, but there was. But when she reached down for it, it was gone. She remembered that she had taken it off, and suddenly grew heartbroken, like I had. She simply sat at the balcony and wept.

Downstairs, I had thrown a fit. I threw the ring at a wall. I tipped my craft bench over. I cut my comfy chair open. I sawwed my chair in half. It was terrible. I felt like that amulet had meant something, like it was a part of her, a part of me. I felt like now that she had taken it off, part of me was missing. Part of my heart.

My heart was broken.

Chapter 15: Betrayal, Riots, and other diseases.

When I awoke, the sound of doors being banged on rang through my ears. I got up to see what it was, and when I got to the front door, I saw a mob outside. It was rather terrifying. They were holding their picks, or their axes, or their hoes. They were hitting the doors, and if the doors weren't iron, they'd have gotten in by now. I wondered what the riot was about. I tried to get away from it to focus, and went upstairs. I went to the hot tub, on the second floor, in an attempt to relax. When I got there, Julia was relaxing, in her bikini. When she heard me approach, she simply got up and dried off as she walked downstairs to change. I sighed a sigh of depression. I went to the third floor, and looked off the balcony at the mob below. I wondered why the people were there. What they were mobbing for, why they found lethal force necessary.  
>I didn't notice before, but there was someone behind me. I didn't notice until he attacked me. He attempted to lift me out of my chair, but I punched him square in the face with my good arm. He dropped me out of pain, and my whole world started spinning. I wasn't in a good enough shape to be dropped. I saw him draw a dagger. I looked at his outfit, and realized I'd seen him before. He was around my age, only 5 years older. I wondered why someone would be attacking me. It was betrayal. One of the people in my town. "Are you working for John?" I asked him. "No." He replied, picking me up again. I tried to punch him again, but he tied my fist down. He walked out onto the balcony, and placed me on the ledge. I looked down, and saw how far the drop was for the first time. I knew if I fell, I would die. I remembered that respawning thing, but there was no guarantee that I would. He watched me and snickered. "So funny. You can simply kill yourself now, or I could tip you. Easily. Just a little push, and.." He was about to push me, when someone jumped on his back. He tried to push the figure off, but to no avail. I saw what appeared to be an amulet, but it might've been my imagination. I did see long hair, though. The attacker back up into a wall, squashing the figure between him and the wall. The figure fell on the floor, and slumped over. I saw the amulet again, but this time I knew it was real. The figure looked up. Julia had come to save me. "Goddamnit! I was so close." He groaned. Then he kicked Julia in the head. She almost went unconscious, on the verge of blacking out. All of the sudden, I heard the doors two floors down break open. Julia tried to lean on a wall, grasping her head. "Watch this, little girl." He said. He took out his knife, and looked at me. He threw the knife, and it hit me in the foot. But it was enough. I spasmed a little, and it threw me over the edge. Julia suddenly jumped up and ran to the balcony. She saw my face as I fell. A lighthearted, joking smile. A smile that showed no regret. Julia looked away before I hit the ground. I died almost instantly, cracking the stones under me. My lifeless body laid there. A cripple, now dead. I was dead, and therefore had to respawn sometime soon, if at all. It felt like forever, but I think Julia should tell you what happened during my time... Away.<p>

{Julia Narrates}

I watched him fall, and saw his smile. It made me feel warm, though only for a second. I looked away from him at the last second. I didn't want to watch. I turned to face the man that had just done this. "You bastard!" I said, tears forming in my eyes. I charged him, and that charge was so full of emotion, of power, that it could've killed him. But he sidestepped, and I missed, hitting the wall behind him. I hit the wall, and it drove me unconscious. Almost. I was seeing black spots in my vision. I knew I would faint soon. But while I could, I watched the angry mob come in the room. Apparently, they knew that there was an assassin. They grabbed him, and took him...

God, I don't want to know what they did with him. It certainly couldn't have been pleasant. But then, as I almost blacked out, I saw a gentle face, somewhat old, with a caring smile. He was slightly chubby, and he looked as welcoming as... Well, a welcome mat. When I saw him, I knew who it was. Notch.


	2. 100 Days To Mine PT2

THIS IS PART 2 OF THE STORY 100 DAYS TO MINE.  
>100 Days To Mine Part 2<br>(Still) By: Zuned1  
>Chapter 16: Our Moment of Weakness.<br>{Julia}

I'd woken up, leaning against the same wall I'd run into. I was confused at first, unable to remember my own name. Then it all came rushing back to me. It hit me like... Like a wall. The recent events suddenly flashed through my mind, and I grew sorrowed. Tears started forming in my eyes. I didn't want to believe it. I ran down to the bottom of the castle, and ran outside. I ran around the castle until I came to the side the balcony faces off of. I saw a crowd, gathered around something. I had a terrible fear that I knew what it was. I pushed through the crowd, and made my way to the center. What I found disturbed me. It was terrible...  
>I looked at the body. Alex's body. The ground had been somewhat chipped into, with cracks all around it. All the cracks were filled with blood. His limbs were distorted, facing in ways they obviously weren't meant to. There was bone sticking out of his elbow. I didn't want to look at his face, but I did. It filled me with dread. His eyes were closed, blood streaming out of his nose. His smile was the same as when he had fell. The knife was in his side. I didn't dare touch. I grabbed his hand and starter bawling into it. I wasn't ashamed to cry in front of everybody. I sat there, and cried. I didn't know how long I'd been crying, but I knew it had gotten dark out. I got up and went to bed. I didn't want to see anybody, or be distracted by anything. I wanted to sleep.<p>

The Next Day I woke up, by eyes swollen and red. I felt like I had when I'd first arrived; confused, alone, and scared. I got angry, and started to punch the wall nearest me. I cried, the tears filled with anger. All of the sudden, some grabbed my shoulders and turned me to face them. I came face-to-face with a little boy. I was roughly 5'8"; the boy in front of me was 4'7". He had blonde hair, in a bowl-cut, like Beetles style. He looked no older than age 10 or so. I was startled someone his size would have such... bravery. "Listen, girlie. You gotta calm down. Your friend is dead, and I know you two absolutely loved each other. But believe me, crying isn't going to do anything. And also, about that apocalypse.. It's coming earlier than even Notch predicted. It's coming today." I listened to what he said. I wasn't in the mood for such crap, so I told him, 'Alright, little boy. Go back to your mommy, and let me handle it." He just gave me a face that said, 'I'm not little, I don't go to my mommy, and I deserve respect.' I just stared at him. He stood there, pouting. I laughed, and I couldn't help it. He had such a serious face on himself, and he was so young. "Alright, if you won't listen to me, then don't. But when we're all dead, just you watch. You'll say, 'We should've listened to Phillip! He was right all along!' And I'll be laughing." He said. He stomped his feet as he climb out the door. I ignored what he said, and went into a small depression. I thought about all the good times I'd had with Alex. I laughed when I thought about how we'd treated each other when I'd first arrived. I didn't know how long I'd been thinking, but it had actually been a long time. It was 6 hours later when I began to wish Phillip had been wrong.

I came out of my little brain space when I heard an explosion. I remembered the wall had been fixed, and began to relax a little. I climb all the way to the top of the tower, and looked at the scene before me. There were hundreds of them. It was sundown, and there were already hundreds of them. I saw the zombies walking, appearing to be the main fighting force. The grunts. The skeletons, with their bows, followed. Mixed in the crowd now and then were spiders. Leading the invasion were creepers. They would charge at the wall, and blow it up. They only blew out a certain amount of wall, but soon, the wall was breached. All the monsters started flowing through the hole, when there was a sudden boom. It hadn't been a creeper. I looked at the inner wall, and saw Phillip. He had bows, with TNT tied to the arrows. He notched another arrow, lit the fuse, and fired. It hit the crowd, and blew up a good chunk of the monsters. I quickly ran down the tower and joined him. I got a few of the good archers in the town, and got them to Phillip. He had a giant stockpile of the arrows, and so all the archers took a few. Meanwhile, I'd gotten most of our knights ready. All the children, elders, disabled people, and females unfit to fight were brought to the castle for safety. Meanwhile, most of the monster army was gone, when suddenly the stockpile was empty. No more explosive arrows. I cursed, and grabbed my sword from my room. When I got back to the fight, the inner wall had been breached. The knights were fighting the zombies, who were surprisingly deadly. The skeletons were firing volleys of arrows, but our archers were quickly dispatching them. We were going to win. The zombies were almost gone, no creepers left, most spiders were dead, and the skeletons were being finished off. It seemed short, but the battle had taken a good 5 hours. I went over and hugged Phillip. He was smiling, and cheering. I gave him a big hug, so thankful that he had made his arrows. "By the way, I'm actually 8." He said. I was so shocked at this. I don't know why, but I was. I just gave him a hug, and ran to the castle. There, I saw everybody still scared. "You guys! We won! Don't be scared, they're gone!" Suddenly, they all began cheering. I didn't know what to do, I was so happy. Then, I was hit by a sudden wave of drowsiness. So I went down and went to sleep. It took me a while, but soon the adrenaline faded.

Chapter 17: Phillip's People Phobia.  
>{Julia}<p>

"Phillip, you're going to tell me; do you have any special powers?" I asked him. We were on the third floor, sitting at a table on the balcony. "No. Why do you think that?" He said. His voice was small, and cute. It made it hard to believe that he could have powers. But I had proof. "Last night, you said to me, 'By the way, I'm 8.' Why'd you say that?" He was at a loss for words. I could tell he knew he'd been cornered. "Because, in your room yesterday, you said that I was 10. I heard you." He said. He seemed so very convinced. "Phillip, I didn't say that. I thought it, yes, but I never said that I thought you were 10." His face was one of shock. "No! You said it! I heard you!" He was shouting now. He didn't seem to realize it, that he could... Read people's minds? It seemed that was what it was. And who knew what else he could do? "Alright, go Phillip. I don't need you anymore." He ran out, relieved. I sat at the makeshift table, and thought. My mind was full of even more questions, as if being distracted by Alex's death, the recent invasion, and other problems wasn't enough. I tried to distract myself.  
>I walked out of the inner wall, and into the outer wall. The wall had been finished, until it was recently destroyed. I'd gotten people to finish it off, and close the hole. I was just glad the apocalypse was over. But something had been nagging at the back of my mind. Had John been attacked too? I snuck off without telling anyone. Then the thought that this was almost exactly what Alex had done began to nag at the back of my head. I got over it, and soon arrived at the castle. I climbed over the wall by using some of the loose bricks, and made my way to the castle. I grew nervous when I saw it. It was the place where... I didn't even want to think about it. I grabbed the moss on the wall of the castle, and climbed it to the top. When I got to the 3rd floor, I got in. It was John's floor. He was in his bed. He wasn't wearing a shirt. He head a bandage on his lower torso. All around his stomach, it was black and blue. He opened his eyes, as if he sensed me. He looked at me. A mischievous... No... Promiscuous smile formed on his face. I grew nervous. "So, you chose me. You chose me over that pathetic loser. But you couldn't have earlier?" He said, strained. "No, you bastard. I didn't come for you. I came to ask you something." His smile dissipated. "Before you ask, let me ask you something. What reason is keeping me from calling the guards?" "None. But this is important." He frowned, and nodded to continue. I told him what had happened last night, and then asked him if he had been attacked. "No. There weren't any attacks, not that I was told. And I'm always told." He said, sure of himself. Then he got his smile again. "GUARDS! Seal off the entrances! Get a man posted on the walls!" He shouted. He snickered, and laid back. Suddenly, two guards were at the door. I jumped out the window, and grabbed onto the moss. I got close to the ground and jumped the last few feet. I ran to the wall, to escape. I used the bricks, but when I got to the top, two guards with spears greeted me. Rudely.<p>

I was dragged back into John's room. He looked up, and told the guards to tie me to the column. He said he would deal with me later. The guards dragged me to a column, and tied my hands together, to a hook, above me. Then they tied my feet up, and my chest. I thought about how to escape, as the guards left. They extinguished the last candle, and I knew that I couldn't get out. So instead, I began to think I thought about how before, Alex had saved me. But he hadn't respawned yet. I began to lose hope. Alex wasn't coming this time. I was stuck here. I was... John's.

Chapter 18: John's Jacked up.

When I woke up, I felt myself being pulled, and I heard wood scraping stone. I slowly opened my eyes, and realized I was in a hallway, going up to the top floor of John's castle. I let myself be dragged, and soon we were at the top. I regretted not fighting. John told the guards to wait down below. He then looked at me. I was on the ground, tied up, and gagged. He looked at me. "Here we are again. You tied up, and me with a dirty idea. But this time, not the same one. You'll see." He said. Then he walked over to me. He kneeled down on top of me, and began his dirty acts. He unbuttoned my shirt, and took it off. Completely off. He balled it up, and threw it off the roof of the tower we were on. He did the same with my pants. He was on top of me, and I was hopeless, as well as somewhat nude. I was under him, wearing nothing but my black bra and my black thong. He had the same smile he wore when Alex hit him. I wanted to cry.  
>John didn't get dirty... At least not that bad. He started kissing me, forcefully. I hated it. He forced his tongue into my mouth, and I bit it. He jumped up, appearing to be done with me. He called the guards back, and gave them instructions inaudible to my ears. Then, they tied me up to the wooden pole that had been near us the whole time. I didn't wonder exactly what they were doing, until they started hanging me over the edge. I thought they would drop me, and kill me... I got very nervous. Then, they began to fix the wood into place. I realized what my torture was. I was to hang, semi-nude, over everyone in John's kingdom. And if I cut myself free, I'd drop and die.<p>

I don't know how long I'd been hanging there. 3, 4 hours? John came back up, obviously with intentions. "Alright, Julia, are you sorry for what you've done to me?" I just stared at him, with an angry expression. I was embarrassed. I'd seen plenty of men making bad gestures, females giving me looks, children pointing and laughing, and even one guy painted a picture of me.

"Julia!" He screamed, "You'd better be sorry! Or else you will be!" He was steaming. After staring at me give him bad looks, he couldn't take it anymore. He thrusted his foot out, and kicked me, in my breast. It hurt like hell. I winced, and my eyes teared up a bit. He laughed. "Are you sorry now?" He said. I nodded, beginning to cry. He motioned for two guards to untie me from the log. He took us back down into his room. He tied me to his bed. Again. He paced in front of his bed. On the way out, a guard bumped a vase off a table. John gave him a look, and the guard left. He turned back to me. "So. You're sorry. How can I believe you?" He said. "I was hanging nude in front of your freaking populous! You kicked me in the boob!" I shouted. He laughed. I wonder why he didn't have a girl. He untied my arms, but made sure that my chest was tied down. "So you're sorry. Are you willing to prove it?" He said. My eyes grew wide. "What do you mean by that?" I asked. He went over to the window. When he saw how dark it was, he was startled. "I guess we'll have to wait till tomorrow, won't we." And he tied me to the pole closest to the door. He went to sleep, and extinguished the candles. I sat there, hopelessly, and realized something. Earlier, the guard had broken a vase. And I was near it. I tried to find a sharp piece, and found one. I wanted to cut myself free, but couldn't. Instead, I hid it in my bra, and waited for the next morning. I expected it to be eventful.

I woke up tied to the bed again. It was getting repetitive. "So. I think you know how you can prove yourself." He said. "Of course I do. And you know what? I've thought about what you've said, everything you've said here. How Alex was weak, and unfit to be a leader, and that he was terrible. And you know what? I agree. Alex is a scrawny little brat. And I want to prove myself to you. So come here, and let's get it on." I said. He looked startled at first, for obvious reasons. But then he smiled at me. He climbed in bed, on top of me. He cut the ropes off my arms and legs. He unzipped his pants, and laid down on top of me. I won't describe it entirely. But yeah, it happened. It needed to be done. We went for 5 minutes, until it was the perfect time. That was when I made my move. His eyes were closed, so I took the glass shard out of my bra, and thrust it up into his stomach. His eyes opened in terror. "But you.. We.. You..." And he started mumbling things, sentences that only got one word out. I pushed him off of me. He laid there on the bed, naked. I pulled up my thong, and wiped the blood of my stomach. I suddenly became nauseous at what happened. The fact that I had lost my virginity to John, the douche. I wished I had lost it to Alex, not the rapist douche bag. I gathered my senses, and went down the tower, the mossy way. This time, John would surely die. I fled the kingdom, back to my kingdom.

I had snuck into my room, past everyone. It would've been embarrassing. But wouldn't you know, inside my room, waiting for me, was blasted little Phillip. "Oh, not what I expected you to wear, a girl like you. But whatever, I suppose. You know, what you said earlier, about my powers... You were right. I don't have powers. I didn't know it at that time, but I've harnessed them now. I can control them. And, uh... I won't tell anyone what happened with you and John." I was shocked. It was true. I sat down next to him on the bed, forgetting I was almost naked, and put my arm around him. "I like you, Phillip, And you'd better not." I said.

Chapter 19: We Lose Hope.  
>{Alex}<p>

I'd been... It felt like floating, in a big, dark, vast, never ending void. I didn't know what was happening. Until an unknown amount of time had passed. I opened my eyes. I tried to figure out where I was. I was in a hospital. In my real world. I looked around, and knew it for sure. There were no TVs, no big expensive medical equipment, and no mothers in Julans. I looked at my mother's face. I expected to see her fuming, screaming at me for stealing her car. But she wasn't. She grabbed my hand, and looked at me. "Please Alex, please be okay. Just... Promise me you'll be okay, okay?" I smiled at her. "I'll be fine Mom. Don't worry." I began to slip back into unconsciousness, back into the black void, where I was to stay.  
>{Julia}<p>

"Phillip, we both know it now. You have... Some kind of power, and probably even more. So you gotta promise me something. Are you gonna use that power for bad? You have to promise me that you won't." I had been talking with him for a while. He nodded, hardly paying attention to what I was doing or asking. He was busy thinking about something. What, I didn't know. I asked him a few more questions about how long he'd thought this had been going on. Then he asked me something. "Do you think Alex will ever come back?" I cringed a little. That was a sensitive topic recently. "I truthfully... Don't know. I don't know if he will, but it actually looks like he won't... He's been gone too long. If he's been reborn already, it wouldn't have taken him this long to find his way back here. And I know John couldn't have gotten him. He gonna be a little... Preoccupied." I said the last sentence with a smile. Phillip smiled too. "Wait, Phillip... Is there a slight chance that you could be more than just a mind-reader? Could you... Like... Be someone who also has telekinesis and other superpowers?" I asked him. I looked very desperately at him. He thought for a moment, and then got a very frustrated face. "Eh, Phillip, what are you doing? Please don't try to blow up on me." He just kept focusing. I traced his gaze, and found he was focusing on a spoon. We sat for a few minutes, and then the spoon did something amazing. It started shaking, then started to hover. It hovered, and came over to me. Then it dropped to the floor. I looked at Phillip. We both stared at the spoon in awe.  
>It had been 3 hours since the spoon. The burial for Alex had been held. The bodies of victims usually disappear when they're going to be brought back, but Alex's didn't. It stayed where it was. Today, we buried it, and held a proper burial. It was the start of our graveyard. We gave him a grand gravestone, made of iron, with gold and diamonds to spice it up. The epitaph on it read, 'Here lies the savior, the creator, and warrior. May Alex Rest in Peace.' I walked away from the scene crying. Phillip placed a few flowers, and left to comfort me. Back at the castle, we prepared for night time. "Phillip... I was wondering. Would you like a room in the castle? It's the safest place here. I'm not sure anyone outside will accept you anymore, knowing your current state." I gave him a look that said, 'Please? I'd love it if you did.' He nodded. "Great! I won't be so lonely anymore. You can have, uh... John's room. He won't need it again. Just make yourself comfortable for tonight, we'll redo it tomorrow." And so me and Phillip went to sleep, unaware of the army of men, swords, arrows, and, uh... 'Tamed' zombies approaching us.<p>

Chapter 20: Our Occupation.

Somehow, John had managed to find out that our kingdom was leaderless, and our army was still recuperating from the apocalypse. No one had been killed, only injured. But we were weak. We surrendered to their armies, because we knew that we would lose. Their occupation has lasted 3 days. It has been 5 days since the apocalypse, meaning that if Notch had been right, there were 5 days till the apocalypse. They have allowed me and Phillip to remain in the castle, however under surveillance.  
>{Alex}<p>

I've been in the hospital for 2 weeks, apparently. I kept showing vitals, but I never became conscious, till two days ago. I'd sort of like the hotel. I hadn't been badly injured in my accident. My legs had been punctured by the door, and my arm had been cut by the glass. I was walking back to my room from dinner one night, when I was given the chance to see Julia one more time. Someone walked into my room. It was a man, appeared to be 40. He looked kind, and was round around the tummy. "Hello, Alex. I'm Notch. I followed you here, to give you a chance. The world you left is no longer there. It has been changed, altered... But I give you a chance. You may return there, with me, or you may stay here. But know this, Alex. That world, Julans," He gave a chuckle and continued, "Is real. So much more than real. It's another dimension. Some people are given second chances there, almost like a limbo that gives you a second chance. I must return there; I created that world, and it belongs to me. But I have come here, because I wish to offer you the choice of returning." He closed his eyes and summoned a portal on the wall. "I will go. You have 5 minutes to decide whether you would like to come or not." And at that, he left through the portal. I sat and stared at it, at it's marvelous beauty. I could see many different dimensions through it. I saw one made of candy, one made to be very modern, like the future, one where everyone was kind to each other. I wanted to go back to Julans. I got up, and walked to the portal. I stared into it. I longed for my kingdom. I longed to see Julia again, to rule as a king. But I could stay here. With my mom, where I belonged. At looked back at the portal. I wanted it, so bad... I took a step into it, and was suddenly thrown with such force. It suddenly made a loud popping noise as I was sucked into it.  
>I flew through the black, feeling the multiple G-forces on my face. I suddenly saw a light in the distance. I was thrown out of a hole in the ground, much like last time. I fell into a tree, which cushioned my fall slightly. I fell to the bottom, and bruised my butt. I'd expected to not retain my wounds from before, but I had. The same clothes I'd been wearing, the same cast, the same grease and grime on my face... It was all suddenly the same. I felt like crap. I walked around a bit, my legs appearing to have healed slightly. I remembered a certain tree, larger than all the others. It pointed to the direction of my kingdom. And so, I head out in that direction.<p>

Back in the hospital, the portal had not yet dissipated. I had ignored what would have happened to it, and simply went through. But the pop had attracted the attention of two twin children in the room next to me. They'd heard the pop, and decided to investigate. They walked into my room, and saw the portal. They shared an amazed expression with each other, and walked over. The male touched the portal, curious about what it was, and it sucked him in. The girl cried and ran after him. They were both sucked into the portal, to be deposited into Julans.

I saw it getting dark out. Unsure of whether there were to be monsters or not, I stopped and made a simple dirt shelter. I took some torches that had been illuminating nothing, and put them up on my house. I made a dirt bed, and laid down for the night.

The twins were spat out of the earth, their landing a bit luckier. They landed in a large lake, and then swam to shore. They wandered into the forest, and soon saw the light coming off of my small shelter. That was what changed their fate forever.

Chapter 21: Double Trouble.

The twins approached my small hut. I was asleep, but one of them stepped on a stick, and since my senses were in hyper drive, it was enough to wake me up. I perked up, and looked out the makeshift window. I saw the two twins approaching my small makeshift cabin. They came closer, and I examined them once they were in the light. The male was fairly tall, 5'5", brown, bushy hair, blue eyes, not very muscular, a slight tan. The girl was a little shorter than the boy, but certainly different. I didn't know they were twins until they would tell me later. But as for the girl, she had blonde, long, straight hair, blue eyes, and she was slightly pale. She had freckles on her nose and under her eyes.  
>They approached my hut. I shouted at them through the hole in the wall I made. "Hey! Get in here, now! It's dangerous out there!" They looked at me, and then ran to me. I ushered them inside, then sealed off the door. "Who are you two?" I asked. "I'm Aaron! But people call me Ari." He said, enthusiastically. "I'm Arianne." Said the girl. "We're twins. Fraternal, of course." Said Ari. I laughed at the thought. I don't know why, it seemed funny to me. "So, twins... How old are you guys?" I asked. "We're 12!" They said simultaneously. I could tell then, that they were twins. "Well, guys. Here's what you ought to know about this world you're in, as general ground rules. First; Never go out at night unarmed. There are monsters crawling around this place at night. Second; always try to remember where you are. And third; Don't trust the man named John. Now you two... Make a pile of dirt for your bed, or sleep on the floor. I'm going to bed." I said. I went to bed, while Ari and Arianne stayed up. They were on the ground, talking for a little.<p>

"Can we trust him? He seems sneaky to me." Arianne said. "I think so. At least, for now. There are monsters out there, just look. If we leave, we're going to most likely die. So let's just trust him and sleep for now." Said Ari. He laid his head down, and fell asleep near instantly. Arianne laid down, and tried to sleep, but obviously couldn't. She seemed unable because she was scared of me, for whatever reason. Then, the three of us were soon asleep. We slept until the next morning, where a shocking discovery would shock me.

Chapter 22: Revenge is a Dish Best Served by a Handicap.

We'd been walking for a couple of minutes. I'd taken the torches from the shelter, and had started to head out for the kingdom. I took the twins with me. On the way, Ari started asking me a ton of irritating questions, and I answered them all.  
>"Where are we going?"<br>"My kingdom."  
>"You're a king?"<br>"Yes."  
>"Can we be your royal advisors or something?"<br>"Uh... Maybe."  
>"Do you have a princess?" He asked. That one had struck a nerve. I'd cringed when he'd said princess.<br>"Well... I'm hoping I do. Don't ask what that means, it's a long story." And we continued on in silence. Behind me, the twins were mouthing words back and forth. "What do you think he's hiding?" Arianne mouthed. "Something big." Ari replied. They continued on behind me in silence.  
>We arrived at the castle, but I'd stopped short, behind a tree. I saw guards at the gate, but knew they weren't mine by their armor. They wore iron encrusted with gold. My army wore a mixture of leather, iron, and diamond. I watched the guards and knew they weren't mine. ~Time to put my secret entrance to good use.~ I thought. I'd built a secret entrance, knowing that John could very well attack me. It was in the mine, in the mountain. The one where we'd found the hourglass. We'd built a wall to prevent people from finding the glass. But there was still a minecart track leading to the trap I'd placed. "Get in the cart." I told the twins. They obeyed, and I gave the cart a push. At the last second, I hopped in too. I grabbed the sides of the cart, and leaned to keep the cart from falling over. The twins were simply shouting with glee. I sighed, and kept goon. When I saw the special Redstone torch, I shouted to the twins, "Jump!" and we all did. The cart triggered a block of TNT, which hadn't hurt any of us since we'd jumped. But the minecart ended up falling into a pit of lava. The twins stared at each other, their mouths gaping. "That's not all." I said. I threw a rock, and triggered the next trap. This one was carefully placed to create a hole in the wall. That hole would not affect the room it connected to; you could easily seal the hold off again. I walked into the room, and the twins followed. I then sealed the hole off. I knew where I was; my room. I looked around. If there were a few things I could take, what would they be? I chose a diamond knife I'd made and Notch's diary. I told the twins to take some of the pork in the chest and hold it on them. I looked into the hallway, and saw no one. I walked into the hallway, to Julia's doorway. I saw one guard. He was arguing with Julia about something. I told the twins to be quiet and stay still, and then I went into the room. Julia didn't see me. I stabbed the man in the neck, killing him and preventing him from making any sounds at the same time.<p>

Julia got a look of surprise, then shock when she saw it was me. She sat there for a second, her mouth gaping. I smiled at her reaction, then she jumped up and hugged me as hard as she could. She smiled at my face, and hugged me again. I hugged her back, and laughed. Then she slapped me abruptly. I rubbed my face where she hit me. I looked at her. "Why the hell did you do that? You didn't have to fall over the edge! You freaking left me! Do you realize what's happened while you were gone? John took over! I injured him again! He's still not dead. How are you gonna beat him?" She asked. I sighed. "Listen, Julia. I don't know how I'm gonna do it. But I'm gonna make a door, into your room. So I can visit you when I need to. It'll help, later. Oh, and by the way... I picked up some twins." I said. I gestured for the twins to come inside. Ari had a pout look on his face. I heard him mumble, "I could've sworn they were gonna kiss." I laughed. "Look, Julia. First off, this is Ari and Arianne. I picked them up on my way. I figure they can help me with the resistance. Also... Who is in that room over there? There's a little blonde boy." I asked. "That's Phillip. You should take him too, he's got powers. I'm worried if John finds out, then he'll take advantage of him." And I went and got Phillip. He came inside, looking rather upset. "I don't want to go with him! He can't take care of himself, look at those injuries!" Julia shushed him, and convinced him it was safer for him with me. Then I heard him threaten something like, "I'll tell him!" Julia looked shocked, then got very stern. She whispered in his ear, just out of my earshot, "If you do, I'll feed you to the zombies." Phillip got nervous, and reluctantly agreed.

Me, the twins, and Phillip were all hiking out on the mountain near the kingdom. We were hidden by some trees, so there was a low chance of being discovered. We'd been there for a few days, planning how to free the city from John's grasp, when Arianne came up with a genius plan. Maybe she wasn't useless after all. This was how her plan went: "First, Alex goes and tells Julia her part of our plan. Her part is this: She's going to go out in the kingdom for a stroll, and warn everybody to stay away from the castle, or any guards for the day. Then, we attack the guards. Alex will sneak in through the castle, and with Julia's help, they'll be our ground fighters. Ari will help take out defenses from the gate. Ari, you have the most dangerous job. Phillip, you're to make your supposedly famous TNT arrows. As many as you can. You and I will be raining fire from a nearby tree. Together, we can win this. And if we can get the townspeople to help, even better. Alright? Now get some sleep guys. We've got a big day tomorrow." And so me, the twins, Phillip, and Julia all slept like logs that night, in preparation for the coming battle. Well, I fell asleep a little later than the rest. I was busy.

I was reading Notch's diary. I'd been gone for a week, and wanted to catch up. The first entry:  
>'Beware the monster's that are coming. They're not the true apocalypse. They're simply some monsters that found your kingdom, and are attacking. There's a lot of them, but it's not. Trust me.<br>Notch.'

I was startled. That explained the hole in the inner wall. Creepers. And all the other monsters... That was probably where Phillip used his arrows. I read on.

'This is addressed to Julia. Alex, I wouldn't read this until after the true apocalypse. Believe me, it is better for everyone.'

So I skipped it, to come back later.

'Today, John took rule of Alex's kingdom. I had to retrieve Alex from his true dimension. I'm not sure... If he'll be able to respawn anymore. He must be careful.  
>As for John, he doesn't stay in Alex's kingdom. Thinks it's too dangerous. That should make it easier for Alex, though.<br>Meanwhile, I've been researching. As far as this worlds limits go, I can't find a large concentration of monsters. Not aboveground, not underground, not during nighttime. I believe this means something bigger is coming. I grow nervous.  
>Notch'<p>

And those were the end of the entries. I was startled at the last one. Where could they be, if not here? It made me think; what if the monsters are in another dimension, preparing? We could be way in over our heads.

Chapter 23: Sometimes, it's better when it's not simple.

I awoke that morning, eager, and anxious. We were going to attack. We started with my role; I had to go get Julia in on the plan.  
>I snuck into Julia's room, the way I knew. I told her what she was supposed to do. She agreed, and an hour later, she came back, and told me she had done it. Then, she tossed me a sword, and got her sword. We started to take out all the guards in the castle. If they were alone, we would stab them in the neck. It would kill instantly, and it also silences them. We walked into each room, taking out the guards. We had a little trouble on the top floor, though.<p>

Three guards were eating, and two were on the balcony. Me and Julia went for the ones eating first. I threw my sword at one of them as I opened the door. One drew his sword, the other rose his fists. Julia jumped on the table and ran to fight the one with a sword. I grabbed a chair, and hit my guy over the head with it. I didn't want to risk being more heavily injured, so I was cautious. Julia quickly dispatched her man. Then we snuck up on the two on the balcony. We signaled to all the guards, as well as the citizens, that there was a revolution. We tipped the guards over, and they screamed as they hit the floor. They landed with a crack that reminded me all too much of what happened to Alex. The guards started to rush to the castle, but the guards falling off the tower had signaled the twins and Phillip. All the guards had left the wall, so Ari was going to flank them. But only a few guards made it to the tower. Phillip and Arianne rained arrows, and if the guards weren't killed by the arrow, the explosion certainly did. Only 10 guards made it up the tower. Me and Julia started to fight them. They were terrible fighters, quickly stabbed or fatally wounded. Ari didn't make it up before we were done. He frowned and said, "Why didn't you leave one for me?"

I sat at the elegant table, Julia to my right, Ari to my left. Phillip and Arianne were also there. We were celebrating our easy victory. We toasted, to all of us. Then, we heard a boom, and the ground shook. For some reason, the image of an hourglass with all its sand on the bottom flashed into my head. Then I realized. Today was the day of the apocalypse. Everyone else sat dumbstruck, but I ran to the balcony, and looked down. Even though it was day, it was dark out. There were clouds, purple clouds, swirling. It was almost entirely dark. There was an earthquake, and I grew nervous. Then, I saw it. It was coming, and fast. And it would destroy us, if we didn't stop it. It.. Was...

Chapter 24: Cloudy with a chance of obsidian.

It was rising out of the ground. In front of the castle, a strange black material formed a square on the ground. There was a strange, purple glowing light inside it. I looked at it in amazement. All my friends came up behind me. We all gaped at the strange portal. Then, quick as the portal had appeared, monsters began to flow out of it. I pushed away from my friends, and ran to the bottom of the castle. I shouted for everyone to get inside the castle, onto the second floor. It was the safest place. Or at least, it was. The earth shook once more, and the second floor crumbled onto the first. Luckily, no one got hurt. But it destroyed two usable floors. And if the earth was so shaky, then the third floor couldn't be safe. So I led everyone down stairs, into me, Julia and Phillip's room. When I got back to the ground, my friends were all waiting, their weapons drawn. I smiled at them, and we charged outside. Arianne and Phillip rained their arrows, taking out the monsters. Me, Julia and Ari all slashed and hacked, but neither us nor the monsters made progress. "This isn't working!" I shouted, over the fighting. That's when someone came to our rescue.  
>A hooded figure jumped onto the castle walls. From there, they threw dynamite at the portal. But when the dynamite blew up, the portal didn't. He hung his head, then suddenly grew excited. He started throwing things at the portal. Dirt, rocks, wood, anything he had. He eventually blocked off the portal. Then, using a diamond pick he had, he took one obsidian block, and the portal broke. It stopped generating the light. We all high-fived. We then looked at the hooded figure. "Who are you?" I asked. He didn't respond. Then he said, "I'm just a fellow kid. My name's Carter." He took off the hood of his robe, and then took the robe off. It was a boy my age. He was rather tall, a bit shorter than me though. He had blonde curly hair. He had a small tan. But you couldn't tell easily. The whole world was bathed in purple light. But that was when the second wave came.<p>

The monsters were approaching from every direction. The creepers would blow a hole in the wall, and zombies and spiders and skeletons would flood in. Soon, creepers would exploding in every direction. The wall was coming down around us. Then, the creepers got to the castle. They started to blow it up, and after a while, the castle crumbled. It couldn't support itself. While this was bad, it did keep the townspeople safe.

We all drew our weapons once more. We started fighting, making our way to the rubble. Carter helped us. We fought our way to the castle, when something worse happened. We'd fought our way there, slashing every which way, keeping creepers a good distance away, dodging skeleton arrows, slashing at zombies, and cutting the spiders legs off. We fought hard, and long. But then, we were punished. A portal rose out of the rubble of the castle. But nothing spewed out of it. We all watched it, as we fought. But we started to get overwhelmed, as if we weren't already. I told everyone to get into the portal. So Julia, Ari, Arianne, Phillip, and Carter all ran into the portal, to wherever it would lead. I was about to go in, when suddenly everything stopped. Including me. Creepers stopped, mid-hiss, but didn't explode. Zombies froze in mid-air, mid-pounce. Skeletons froze, their arrows floating. Then, out of the portal, walked Notch. I instantly recognized him. I wanted to say hello, but only my eyes were moving right now.

"Listen, Alex. You're getting close to stopping the apocalypse. I would love to help you, but for an immortal being such as myself, that's a great offense. The galaxy would get mad at me, strange as it sounds. It would get mad, and no matter what I do, I can't hide from it, or stop it. But about the apocalypse... You and your friends will be gone in there a long time. Time there is accelerated from here, which is why the monsters bred so much. You must be careful. There are new enemies there, as well. And the terrain is much different. Sadly, I have no power in that dimension. So I give you this, hoping it will help you."  
>He summoned a sword, made of a fine material. The handle was diamond, with a leather grip. The blade was pure obsidian, refined to be harder and sharper. Down the center was a strip of diamond. It looked beautiful, and deadly.<br>"The blade is obsidian, refined, obviously. You know how strong obsidian is. And the diamond handle will never break. The leather is obviously a grip, but this is enchanted. You will never let go of your sword unintentionally. As for the diamond strip on the blade. That is not just decoration. That, is an enchanted diamond crystal. If you call on its powers, you yourself will be made entirely out of diamonds. You will still be mobile, but you will be stronger than ever. Faster, than ever. And you will be impossible to kill. You can't be maimed, cut, or hit by an arrow. Not even being crushed will make you die. But, it has a repercussion. It draws it's magic from your own lifesource. When you exit diamond state, you will be unconscious, or on the verge of it. So be careful when you use it. Here." He replaced the sword I was holding with the new obsidian one. Then, time unfroze. I continued to strike the monsters down, defeating them much easier. Then, I jumped through the portal myself.

~~~~~

I was spat out of a portal, and I saw my friends. They were standing on what appeared to be a balcony. It was really just a cave in the side of a mountain. Alex looked around at his new surroundings. He was standing on what appeared to be a mixture of both dirt and tiny rocks. Except these rocks and dirt were stained red, blood red. He looked around. The only light sources were the pools of lava all around, and the strange material that appeared to be a glowing stone. But it wasn't the strange way that there was a roof made out of the strange stone, or that there was lava, or the way the land was formed. The reason all of us were gaping at the new world, was because there were monsters everywhere. There was an amazing amount of them. They were all casually walking around. Then, Julia saw something substantial. She saw a portal. For some reason, all the monsters near it were going into it. They realized that all those monsters were going into their world. Julia began to cry at the sheer numbers entering their new world. I started to comfort her. Then, Ari pointed something else out. He noticed a new monster; it was a strange mutated pig. It stood on two feet, like a human, and had the same anatomy, but looked more like a pig. We all sat there, wondering what would become of us. We couldn't return to our world until we dealt with this threat. But there were so many monsters. It seemed impossible. We sat there, and tried to enjoy what seemed like our last moments. We all slowly fell asleep.

Chapter 25: Haters Gonna Hate, Creepers Gonna Creep, Zombies gonna Kill.

All of the kids in the group woke up. They were still in the Nether. How much time had passed, none of them knew. But they wanted to get started killing the beasts. They saw the army, still wandering around, entering the portal, burning in lava, and fighting each other. The kids all started to plan their attack. It had been decided that Alex would go first, since he was the best fighter. Julia would follow, and then Ari. Phillip and Arianne would be using their bows again, as usual. Carter wouldn't be helping anytime soon. He had vanished mysteriously. No one knew where he went.  
>Arianne and Phillip fired a few good shots at the monsters. They spared their ammo, because they only had so much of it left. They took some of the TNT off some arrows, so they could reuse the arrows, and the TNT was now short distance. The TNT blew up, clearing a landing place for Alex and everyone. Alex slid down the side of their mini-mountain, and landed at the bottom. He held up his hand to Julia, signaling not to come down. She stopped, and looked at Ari, as if to ask, 'What's he doing?'<p>

Alex stood there, slashing a few monsters. After a big crowd appeared, he activated his sword's power. He turned into a diamond being. The power in the obsidian sword slowly spread through Alex's body. His hand turned into diamond, then his arm, and soon he was entirely diamond. He could feel the monsters hitting him, and scratching him, but it was not bothering him. He felt it, but it wasn't pain. He noticed that his obsidian sword had become the mere size of a dagger. But because he was diamond, he had no worries for getting close. He stabbed a spider in front of him, then spun around and stabbed a zombie behind him. He lunged to the side, stabbed another zombie. He continued stabbing the creatures. He'd killed a good amount of them, but they kept coming. Soon, his diamond skin turned back into flesh. It was slow at first, just small patches of skin. But when his whole right arm was skin, he knew it was time to run. He motioned for Julia to come down and help him up, but she was too late. By the time she'd slid down, Alex was almost entirely flesh. The monsters had started to close back in, but Alex tried to climb up, assisted by Julia. But the sideffects of his ability kicked in there and then. He promptly fainted, and fell to the ground. Julia jumped down to protect him, and Ari followed.

Phillip and Arianne provided covering fire. They got all the monsters that Julia or Ari would miss. But it soon ended. They ran out of regular arrows, leaving Ari and Julia alone. Arianne looked at Phillip and said, "I don't know about you, but I'm going down there." She slid down, and landed near Alex. She watched Julia and Ari, making sure no monsters got through. Phillip stayed on the mountain. ~I'm too weak for that... No one would be helped if I went down.~ He thought. But then he got an idea. He started to focus on all the arrows littered about.

Arianne noticed the arrow near her shaking. It wasn't an earthquake, it was simply shaking. Then, it was yanked out of the ground by some unknown force. She saw dozens of arrows yanked out of what seemed like years worth of dirt. The arrows all floated, and soon floated up to Phillip. He suddenly had a stockpile, big enough to last the two of them a good 150 shots each. Some of the arrows were old, some had obsidian tips, and some had metal shafts. The variety was amazing.

Phillip tossed down a couple of arrows for Arianne, and then started to open fire. He didn't aim for specific monsters, just groups of them. He let loose, and the monsters started dropping like dominoes. He even set off a creeper, which blew up and cut off a good amount of monsters with lava. Julia gave him a thumbs up, and went back to fighting the never ending waves of monsters. Just when they began to get overwhelmed, Alex slowly stirred. "Wuh... Where are we?" He asked. He looked around, and snapped awake when he saw where he was. He slowly stood up, losing his balance for a moment. He realized what was going on and grabbed his sword. "Guys, spread out a little!" He said. They all spread out, and took on a little bit less monsters each. Alex stabbed at monsters, killing them nearly instantly with the hard rock. Julia had two smaller swords, and she was hacking away, taking down the monsters fast. Ari had a bit more of a battle axe. He swung it through the crowd, taking out vast numbers at once. Together, with Phillip and Arianne's supporting fire, they quickly demolished the monsters in the area. They looked around; there were still other islands with more monsters on them. They all thought. "You guys think there are portals on those islands?" Ari asked. We all stood there, looking at the monsters roaming the various islands. Alex stood there, watching.

Everyone started to walk away from the lavas edge, back to where it was certainly safe. Alex kept standing there. Suddenly, everything stopped again. Including himself. He knew what was happening. Suddenly, in a flash of light, Notch was before him.

"Good job, Alex. You and you're friends have defeated all the monsters on this, eh... Island, let's say. But you know that there are more monsters. You want to know how to defeat hem, correct? Well, here's a secret. All these monsters? Not supposed to be here. Spiders, zombies, skeletons, those greenie meanies? Not supposed to be here. Normally, the heat here would kill them. But there's a crystal here. It's somewhere, hidden in an island. I can't tell you which island exactly, but here's a hint. The island is the gateway, leading to the worlds of this dimension. On the island of gates, you will find your goal. When, or if, you find the crystal, I'll help you once more."

And time resumed itself. I wondered what he'd meant. "The island is a gateway, leading to the worlds of this dimension." I said out loud. Julia heard me, and asked me what I'd said. I told her that I knew how to defeat most of the monsters here. I told her that the creepers, or 'greenie meanies,' as Notch called them, the zombies, spiders and skeletons, were not native here. That the only thing keeping them alive was a crystal. I told her the hint Notch had told me. Everyone started to think what it meant. We all fell asleep around a glowing block, thinking what the hint meant.

Chapter 26: Right Under our Noses.

We had all woken up. We were all eating some of the rations we had brought along. The strange rock in front of us kept glowing. We had all been thinking about it. What island was the 'gateway' to all worlds? We gave up thinking and continued on. We circled around our little isle, looking for an easy way off. That was when it hit us.  
>On the other side, there were more portals. Roughly 5 of them. We looked at all of them. "I'll look through them, see where they all lead." Alex said. He went over to each one of them. He stuck his head through, to see where they all lead. One lead to a prospering world, filled with flying cars, robots, floating islands... It was rather amazing. But Alex wasn't about to go. So he went to the next portal. It was a portal to a world full of strange animals, none of which seemed very friendly. Alex viewed the next portal. He saw John's castle. He could tell it was John's. He saw John fighting, alongside his army, killing the massive amounts of monsters attempting to defeat him. In the next portal, there wasn't anything. It seemed to lead to an empty space. In the last portal, he became slightly shocked. It was his home world. He saw his mother, crying over what used to be his hospital bed. Now it was empty, and she was absolutely bawling. Alex withdrew from the portal with a frown. He was glad it was the last portal. He didn't want to see anything worse.<p>

"Guys... I think this is the gateway to different worlds in our dimension. This is the gateway. And if it is in fact under the gateway, then we gotta go... Down." The last words were spoken dramatically. None of us wanted to go down, but we had no choice. We had to stop the monsters. I took out my diamond pickaxe, and started to mine away the hellish looking rock. I mined for a little, until I came across a large cavern. It was dug into the center of the island. It was a clever hiding spot, as no one would think that the crystal they wanted to destroy was underneath them. We ventured into the castle, and I looked down the mine shaft that had been dug. It was not the neatest thing, but the depth was immense and intimidating. Arianne got slightly nervous when she saw the drop, and lost her balance. Ari caught her, and they slowly regained their balance. In the middle of the shaft, there was a staircase going down. I turned around to face everyone. "Guys... Do we really want to do this? Who knows what's down there. We will probably not make it back that safely, or easily. Are we going through with this?" Alex asked. Everyone nodded yes.

And so began the descent into the deepest pits of the Nether.

Chapter 27: The Deeper, the Deadlier.

We had all been traveling for a long time. Or at least, it felt like it. We'd gone down quite a bit. Arianne had almost fallen off multiple times. We could no longer see the top, nor the bottom. However, we soon saw a blue light at the bottom. Based off of its brightness and size, we guessed it wasn't that far away anymore. And we were right. In what felt like a few minutes, we were at the bottom. We all had the same guess about what the blue light was- the crystal keeping the monsters here alive. We kept walking, until we were almost at the bottom. But then, we encountered a problem. When we got to the bottom, the bottom wasn't there. There was a floor below our stairs, but our staircase didn't connect to it- we all had the same guess as to why this was as well. The arrows in the remaining stairs, the small craters, and the scratches along the walls gave it away. The bottom of the staircase was filled with creepers, zombies, skeletons, and pigmen alike. We all tried to come up with an idea, but the idea of throwing a few sticks of TNT down there won. So we took out the TNT, the flint and steel, and lit a few sticks. We tossed them down, spreading them out, and the resulting explosions destroyed all but one monster, which I quickly dispatched after landing down the stairs. "Come down, guys." He said.  
>We sat down and rested for a little longer. We didn't know what awaited us inside the door, and we didn't want to risk anything.<p>

After we rested for a while, we decided it was time to attack. We opened the grand doors that stood in front of us. They were made of oak and redwood trees. How they got wood down here, we couldn't figure out. We walked into the grand room before us. It was elegantly carved, with only a few stalactites remaining. There was a red carpet going through the center. There were pillars. It all led to the blue crystal that had been giving off the light. But surrounding it, was a giant crowd of monsters. "Alright guys. Let's make this easy. Just shoot some sticks of TNT at the crystal and make sure to hit some monsters as well. Do this right and we can be home before we know it." I said. And they did do it right. The monsters were all killed. But the crystal, however, remained unscathed.

We all walked up to it. It didn't seem to break easy. I took out my sword and tried breaking it that way. I stabbed it, and slashed it, and jabbed it. But nothing worked. We all looked at each other, confused. I told everyone to back up, in case something weird happened. I tried pushing the crystal out of it's strange magnetic hold in the air. It started to move, slowly, and it's light began to fade. The crystal was coming loose, and would break.

But it never did. I had almost pushed it out, when I was thrown away by a mysterious force.

Chapter 28: Notch's Noble Name.

I was thrown away, like a little ant by some greater, more mysterious force. I felt puny, and weak. I looked to see what had hit me. Standing a few feet away from the crystal, was a hooded figure. The figure's entire body was covered. The only viewable feature was the figures mouth. Her hands had gloves, and her cloak covered her entire body. But the mouth was distinctively obvious. The lips were red, as though covered with lipstick. I knew at once that this character was a female. I chose to call her Lady, for the fact that she's female, appears old, and we didn't know her name.  
>I suddenly grew angry at Lady. I hadn't noticed it before, but all my friends were on the ground, seemingly unconscious. Even though they were unconscious, their faces were distorted in pain. The anger inside me grew rapidly, and not thinking, I charged her. I didn't have a plan or anything, I had just charged her out of anger. I struck her, but she rose a shield made of some transparent material. I struck the shield, but I was simply thrown back with my own force. I tried to get up, and looked her in the face. She was smiling. "Who are you?" I asked. She simply chuckled, and I became tortured by some mysterious force. I didn't know what it was, but I suddenly felt like my body was on fire. I fell to the ground, screaming. I fought the pain, as best I could. I began to see splotches in my eyes. I fought to stay conscious, but I couldn't.<p>

~~~~~

I woke up tied to one of the columns around the room. My friends remained unconscious, but they were also tied up. I tried to get out of the bonds, but it wasn't working. I looked around for something to help, but there was nothing in my reach. I gave up hope, when Lady appeared in front of me. Her voice seemed feminine. It sounded too sweet for what seemed to be an evil villain. "Hello, Alex. I know why your here. You want to destroy my great crystal. The one that keeps spawning my little demons. Did you also know that it holds my power? As long as we stay in this room, I am undefeatable. But, I grow bored down here. So I will give you a chance to defeat me. I can create an obstacle course out of this room. That is what I shall do. Your friends shall stay where they are. I will not interfere. You shall receive everything you entered this room with. However, I advise that you hurry. Your friends appear to be, ah, waking up." She said. There was something about the way she said it that made me nervous. But then, in a flash. I was in the front of the room, where the entrance was now a wall. I had my sword, and my armor. I thought that this would be easy, Until I took a step forward. The ground started to crack. There seemed to be a distinctive pattern in the cracks. I thought that perhaps I just shouldn't step on them, but I was proven wrong. The ground that wasn't supported began to sink. I felt a sudden burst of heat.  
>The ground fell into the lava. It formed a distinctive path of small islands, and long, narrow pathways. I thought that this would be the end of the transformation, but I was wrong. My friends began to stir, and I saw Julia looking at something. In front of me, a zombie was closing in. I kicked it back, and cut its upper body off. I kicked the halves into the newly formed pools of lava. I looked back at Julia, and saw that she was still supported on a small rock island. I continued on the path. Suddenly, a skeleton came out of the lava. It was covered in lava, and would burn on the touch. I didn't know that then, though. I saw it drawing an arrow, so I kicked it back into the lava. This didn't kill it, only stopped it. But it had burned through my foot. I screamed in pain. I didn't know how I would continue, because my foot burned. I was almost halfway there, but that wasn't enough distance for my foot to make it. I thought, and decided to jump along. It was hard, but it was the only way.<p>

I soon came to monster I had not seen before. It was floating in air, with tentacles. I saw it preparing to attack, so I raised my sword in defense. But then, it spat out a rock at me. I didn't know what the rock was, so I simply dodged to the side. But then, the rock hit the small rock I was on, and the force almost threw me off. I lost my balance, and was about to fall into the lava. I saw my life flash before me. I had gone plenty of times before, but that was reason to think I wasn't about to come back. I simply let myself fall backwards, when I remembered. I had the sword. The obsidian sword with the power. I focused my energy at the last second, and I turned to diamond as I splashed into the lava. It absorbed me, and I felt the heat against my sparkling skin. I heard Lady laughing from above. She thought I had died. I took advantage of this. I began to swim in the direction I knew was the way to the crystal. I swam through the lava, it feeling like nothing more than a hot tub to me. I rose my head above the surface. I looked around, and climbed onto the rock near me. I got to the top, and was a few feet away from the crystal. Just one jump. But I became distracted by the cries and coughs of my friends. I saw my friends crying for me, sad that I'd fallen into lava. But then, they all started coughing. Blood began to stream out of their mouths. They began to grow cuts along their body. I knew what was happening, and knew I had to hurry. I jumped across the pit, and using my new diamond strength, started pushing the crystal. I pushed, and it fell into the lava. It fell off of its magical stand, and rolled into the lava. It began to melt, and the magic flowing from it to Lady was viewable through my diamond eyes. She began to spasm, now filled with her power.

I jumped from rock to rock, and soon came to the one she was on. She was on the floor, in shock. She hadn't felt the magic actually coursing through her blood in forever. The experience came as a shock to her. She laid on the ground. I took the opportunity. I lifted the hood off of her face.

I gasped. I couldn't believe what I saw.

Chapter 29: Men sure can pick 'em.

The face under the hood was Notch's wife. I tried to remember what her name was. Ez, I think he'd said? I just kneeled next to her, in shock. Notch's wife... She wasn't dead. She was alive. She hadn't died. She'd been here to whole time. Breeding monsters. I just kneeled there, in shock, when she regained consciousness. She took her opportunity. She froze my friends around me, and everything else, much like Notch had. I could still move, but didn't let her know.  
>"Listen, Alex. You've most likely guessed who I am. I am in fact Ez, Notch's wife. I know you thought I was dead. But I wasn't. Listen... I'm going to give you a choice. You have a lot of power. I have a lot of power. I could make those monsters follow you, I could give you invincibility. You could have power. All the power in the world, and all you have to do, is kill one of your friends. I'm going to give you a moment to decide." She said. She flew into the air and hovered there. ~What? But I couldn't. That would be... I could never live it down. I would live out my never-ending life tortured by the memory. All my friends would hate me, as if being evil weren't enough. But I realized something. I took out Notch's diary, unaware that I'd had it this whole time. It seemed he was watching me again.<p>

'Alex, I know you won't have much time. So to help you quickly, I'm going to tell you something I hadn't before. The only way to kill us is to use our own weapon. I didn't tell you because I didn't know if I could trust you. Please, use this knowledge for good.'

I could tell he'd been watching me. I thanked him silently, hoping he could somehow hear it. I stood, and answered her question. "I'll do it." I said. She slowly formed a smile on her face. "Wonderful! Just wonderful! And don't worry, I can keep all your other friends safe. They won't know that Julia has died. I'll pu-" But I interrupted her. "Wait. Julia? You said 'a' friend. Not Julia." I stared her down. "Yes, but to truly test your loyalty, I've decided you must kill your true love. To be truly worthy, one must sacrifice anything." I looked at Julia, her face and it's features. She was frozen in time, her face with no particular expression on it. Just a simple look. It was beautiful. I didn't know how I would will myself to kill her.

A dagger flew down, and started floating in front of my face. I looked at it. It was made of diamond, and seemed to be glowing. I looked at Ez. "That's my own dagger. I want you to kill her with it. It shall make me stronger, her blood on the blade. And since you shall be holding it, you will also become stronger. Now take it, and end her life." I reluctantly took the dagger, trying to hide the tears coming out of my eyes. I slowly walked towards Julia's unmoving body. She just stood there, tied up, her neutral expression making me even more guilty. I began crying, not trying to hide it. There was anger mixed with it. I rose my arm, preparing to strike, and growled as I struck. My face was covered in tears, and anger was what was showing.

I struck Julia.

Chapter 30: I regret nothing.

But hit the wall. I intentionally did it. I couldn't kill the love of my life, and suffer with that, even for invincibility and power. I turned around. I took the dagger out of the wall and put it in my belt. I stared at Ez, a fire in my eyes. She'd wanted me to kill my love. Now that she'd given me her dagger, I was going to kill her. I ran straight at her, screaming. My friends remained frozen in time. I rose my sword, and struck. But the coward rose another wall. This time, I flew and crashed into a column. The force was terribly painful, and I almost blacked out. But thankfully, I was able to watch what would happen next.  
>I saw a blue flash, and Notch appeared in front of me. Ez gasped. Notch was standing there, holding his staff. He looked angry for the first time. The following battle was certainly going to be amazing. Notch rose his staff, and a burst of blue light came out of it. Ez slapped the ball away and it dissipated on the wall it hit. I watched them battle it out, seeing who had the better spells. Ez continued to deflect all of Notch's spells. Then she fought back. She threw a ball of red energy at Notch. It hit him square in the chest. I thought he would be down. But instead, he looked stronger, while Ez began to look weaker. I didn't know what was going on, but Notch could tell he was winning. "Face it Ez. I'm stronger." He said. He threw three balls of energy. Two, Ez blocked, but the third one hit. It confused me, why Ez suddenly grew weaker still instead of growing stronger like Notch had. But I watched as she fell to a knee. "Ez, why did you lie to me? I thought you were dead. I grieved for months. Why did you betray me?" He asked. She started to cry. "I betrayed you because I loved you. I was evil, from the moment we met, till now. I was never good, I just pretended because I loved you. But the evil side of me took over and now... Here we are. I paid someone to kill me with a dagger that looked to be mine. But it wasn't, not really, so I survived with ease." She began to bawl. I watched the scene. An angry husband, broken and betrayed. A fiendish wife, crying at her own evil deeds. It was quite a scene. But then Ez stood up.<p>

The battle continued. Ez threw an energy ball at Notch. He jumped, did a triple-backflip, and threw three energy balls in midair. Ez fired her own energy balls, which hit Notch's. For some reason, they floated there, two opposite energies fused. Notch made the first move. He flew forward and slapped two of them, and they flew at Ez. She deflected one back to Notch, and the other one flew by her. But it didn't stop at the wall, it continued bouncing around the room, a ball not affected by Newtonian physics. Notch dodged the energy, and threw the last one at Ez. They co

ntinued battling it out this way. Notch would throw one at Ez, who would deflect it. It would bounce around until Notch caught it again. Then the tides turned. Notch had all three of them, and using his own power, he infused them with each other. He created one, giant ball of energy, and threw it at Ez. She stood there, flabbergasted, as the giant ball of energy flew straight at her.

And then it hit.

Chapter 31: And it all comes down.

Ez tried to deflect the ball of energy, but it didn't work. She was hit full on, and she was thrown to a column. Instead of the energy bouncing off of her, it went into her. It seemed to cause her pain. She sat there, spasming, on the column. I watched, still in pain, on my column. Notch frowned and turned to me. And what happened next would ensure I could never live a normal life.  
>"Alex... I have only spoken to you few times in person. Once to convince you to come here and fight. Once to give you a weapon. Now, I am giving you a gift. A gift most probably the best one you will ever receive. You can choose to decline it, but I advise you don't." He said. I looked at him with curiosity, and he simply answered the question going through my head. "Your gift? Well. Haven't you ever thought, in your time here, that it would be great to be a wizard, like me? Well, your close to right. Except that I was shunned. My culture shunned me, and so I created my own world. Ez came with me. But... It is against galactic rules for a wizard to kill another wizard. Even so, I couldn't kill Ez. Even if she was evil. I think you know what I'm asking."<p>

I did. He wanted me to take the dagger in my hand, and kill Ez with it. But... I didn't think I could. I've killed before, but not like this. Not in cold blood. But... To be a wizard. To be like Notch. The temptation took me. I stood up, despite the pain, and began to walk towards Ez. She was unconscious now. I walked over to her, clutching my side. I think I'd broken a rib.

I came to Ez. She looked peaceful, and it was hard to believe that she was evil. But I knew she was. I took the dagger from my belt and stared at her. If I stabbed her, she would die, and I would get her powers. The thought was scary, as tempting as it was. I turned to face Notch. "But, what about my friends? We're still frozen in time. They won't know, only that I defeated Ez. They won't know I'm a wizard. Would I be allowed to tell them?" I asked. Notch thought before answering. "No. If they manage to find out on their own, then it's okay. But... No, you can't just tell them." I grew saddened. I turned back to Ez. I took the dagger from my belt, rose my hand, and struck. Then, it all went black. The last thing I saw was Notch smiling at me, as he disappeared.

~~~~~

I woke up on the upside of the Gateway to the Worlds. I looked around me. My friends were all around me, fine. We were around a fire. Julia was the first to notice me wake up. "Oh, Alex!" She said. She helped me sit up. "Alex! We were worried about you!" She said. "Wait," I said, "What happened?"  
>Julia explained their point of view to me. They had seen me try to break the crystal. But then, around the point when me and Ez began battling, they suddenly became attached to the columns. Then, the ground was suddenly a bunch of islands in a pit of lava. Then, they were unattached from their columns, and the ground was back. They saw Ez, with the dagger in her stomach, and me, unconscious on the floor. They hadn't seen Notch. They thought I'd become injured, so they began to leave. After they were halfway up the steps, they heard the room cave in. I thought about how they'd missed so much. Notch, saving us. Me, battling it out. Me becoming a wizard.<p>

"Wait, Alex, how long... Since when have you had blue eyes?" Julia asked, her face twisted with curiosity. She kept staring at my eyes. "I don't know. I haven't looked in a mirror since the last time I was brought back." He said. I tried to hide the fact that I was a wizard, but Julia made it hard. After we'd all rested, we decided to go home. We went to the other side of the island, and went through our own portal.

I gasped.

Chapter 32: Ruins of our Mind.

When we came back, the world we were greeted by was more a hell than the one we'd left. It was almost disgusting. We had exited through the same portal as we had entered, but this time, the castle had completely collapsed. As had the city around us. I thought about the people we had left. I walked out of the pile of ruins scattered, and observed the destruction. Houses were blown to bits. The wall was standing in few places. There were a couple of skeletons, human skeletons, scattered around. We looked at some of them. I recognized one to be Carter, the boy who'd saved us. I shuddered at the thought. All around us, there was death and destruction. Ari, Arianne, Julia, little Phillip, me, we were all stuck. We had left, and we were gone... Who knows how long? The monsters had all died off. There was creeper gunpowder lying around, skeleton's arrows, dead zombies, spider's thread. It was terrible.  
>As my friends walked around, looking for any possible survivors, or useful items, I went back to my old bunker. I tried to dig through the rubble, to find the entrance. After a moment, I found it. I walked down the steps, the stone becoming mossy. I entered the hallway, and was greeted by everyone's fate. There were skeletons lying around, more human skeletons. I made my way through them, trying not to be disrespectful of the dead. I managed to get into my room. There were few skeletons in here, and I was glad. I got a few items from my chest, such as wood, stone, food, and equipment. I grabbed the disc out of my jukebox, as well. I couldn't take the jukebox, it was too big. So I took the disc.<p>

Inside of Julia's room, I gathered more equipment for all. I also grabbed the necklace I'd made for her. I put a spell on it, without anyone knowing, both as a test of my powers, and to keep Julia happy and safe. It was like a tracking charm; I could track the necklace, and the necklace would always end up with Julia. I would always be able to follow her and keep her safe.

I walked up the steps with the equipment and supplies. I found a clear spot on the ground, and put everything down. "Alright then, guys. This place is... It's not coming back. It shall remain like this forever, until someone comes and rebuilds it or, whatever happens. This is all we have; a few diamonds, three diamond picks, a diamond shovel, two diamond picks, and a diamond hoe. We also have some iron and leather armor for everyone. And for Julia," I said, placing it around her neck, "The necklace I made. Enjoy it, and let it keep you safe."

We began to travel away from the ruins. They were a mess; uninhabitable, dangerous, and a terrible reminder of what had happened. We walked away from the ruins. I told the others to continue, and I tested my powers once more. I summoned my strength, and pulled off an amazing feat. In an attempt to hide our existence from others, I lifted the ground. You could see a sphere of colored energy surrounding it. The ball lifted into the air, and the objects inside the mixture became even more mixed. The ball lowered itself softly, and it began to look like no one had ever been there. If you started digging there, well, that was a different story.

I caught up to my friends, as we headed off.

Chapter 33: Douche is dead.

We had been traveling for a few hours. We had no exact direction, as there was destruction everywhere. Creeper craters, skeleton arrows... Everywhere. It was terrible. We didn't want to settle somewhere with reminders of what had happened. We continued to travel, and we soon came to more ruins. I had an idea what it was.  
>We stumbled around, trying to figure out where we are. We looked for people, but there only seemed to be signs of life near the destroyed castle. We walked over to it. There were skeletons, all seemingly old. We wondered how long we'd been gone; it almost seemed like years. We looked at some skeletons, and I saw one that was distinctive. The skeleton had a broken rib that was partially healed. The bones themselves were stained with blood. It wore distinctive clothes, but the fact that there were bandages wrapped around some of the bones nearby, it was obvious; John. His army, it had fallen. Just like ours. We had both failed to defend ourselves. But we had tried to survive, and we did. He had fought, and lost. I looked around, to see for anything else, and noticed that the portals had all vanished. It was a relief.<p>

We continued on from John's castle. We were amazed at the destruction one civilization could suffer. I did the same thing to it as I did the last. I let my friends get ahead, while I hid the castle. It was for everyone's good. I mixed up the dirt and rocks like soup, and let the grass grow over it.

We decided to settle for the night. We didn't know whether there would be any monsters, so we all hid in a cave that we boxed up, and lit up. And we stayed there for the night.

Chapter 34: Preparations.

We all woke up when the sun did. We all woke up around then, and one by one, went outside. We all hung around the fire for a little, trying to soak up the recent events. I didn't believe it; In the past, hardly a month, I...  
>I saved the world, became a wizard, met a great man, got a girlfriend, owned a kingdom, and everything in between. I was amazed that I could do that; a month ago I was hijacking my mom's car, and driving it, illegally. Here I was, a hero.<br>We soon started to talk about our plans. "We gotta go somewhere. But where?" I asked. I got various responses. Ari said we should go inland; Arianne said we should go closer to the shore. Phillip said we should stay a safe distance in between. I said that we should sail the seas. Julia became the defining factor, seeing as to how most possible options had been taken. She thought, and agreed with me. Then, it was decided. We were going to sail the seas.

We started to build a boat; it had a room for each of us, or at least our groups; Me and Julia would sleep together. Ari and Arianne would sleep together, and Phillip got a smaller room to himself. The sail would power it, and we would have a storage room, as well as a bathroom. It was a fair sized boat; 10 meters by 27; a sizeable width, and a good length.

I set out to build it. We already had a small supply of planks. Julia had gone to get more wood, Ari had gone to help her, Arianne was getting wool, and Phillip was making the sail. We were almost done, and night began to set. Everyone was helping to finish, getting everything on the ship, finishing the top deck, getting the sail tied up. When night struck, we were ready. We watched as the creepers and zombies, the skeletons and spiders all came to watch us go. One creeper attempted to follow. We all watched off the backside. I held the steering wheel, keeping us steady. The creeper followed us, but soon turned back. We all watched it go. We waved to it.

We were going to miss the island. We were going to miss Julans. It had held all of our hopes and dreams, that had all been crushed. It held the only sign of known life. It had housed us and protected us for so long. Now, we were leaving it. We were headed somewhere, we didn't know where. We were going off to sail the unnumbered seas. Would we come back? Probably not. Would we find somewhere else to stay? Who knew.

I almost started crying as we went. I'd developed an attachment. I waved good-bye to the island. But then I began to wonder...

What had happened that week I'd been gone?

Epilogue

I left a small book that had highlighted our travels. It included everything I knew. I hadn't told anyone about it, except that I wanted to leave something. I had contacted Notch and figured out how to enchant the book like he did. I enchanted it, and left it in a safe place. But, by some chance for fate, it would come back to bite me in the butt...

The book remained wedged between two stones for so long, but alas, stones aren't the best bookshelves. The book became dislodged by the wind one day. Later, a creeper found it. This creeper had wandered around, until he soon came to something he'd thought was a human. He'd started to hiss, but when he realized it was wood, it was too late. He exploded, creating a crater in the ground, and throwing the book into the water. However, it had landed on one of the pieces of wood. It had gotten stuck between two pieces, and the two pieces began to float away from the island.  
>The pieces floated for a long time. They went through storms, through giant waves, through numerous fish attacks. Until one day, a fish got lucky. He managed to get it dislodged, but he hadn't noticed it. He had sum around, and eventually it had fallen off. Only to fall onto another fish. Sadly, this fish was gullible. The fish had grabbed the book in his mouth, when he spotted a shrimp. It was simply floating there. He swam over to take a bite, when he was yanked out of the water. The book went with him. The curious fisherman that had caught the fish took the book, and let the fish go. While the fish had a sigh of relief, the fisherman began to read. He took the book straight to the Monarch.<p>

The Monarch read the story, and an evil plan grew in his mind. Granted, one part was under nature's control, but he knew it would soon happen. He published the story, and Alex became praised as a hero. Julia was praised as a queen. Phillip and Ari, and Arianne were all praised as well. However, only the Monarch knew this to be a true story. For when he'd written the word, 'Greetings.' In it, the word, 'Hello there!' Had appeared.

~~~~~  
>THE END <p>


	3. Notch City

Notch City  
>By: PopRocks<br>The City:

He began his life in an obsidian room. He had suddenly appeared, naked, and sweating. For about ten minutes, his mind struggled to get familiar with existence. He looked around. The room was all black, and there was a single iron door at the far end. He waited, but for how long, he did not know; time wasn't all that clear to him yet.  
>A lady came through the door. She smiled and helped him up. She talked to him slowly as she dressed him, and to his surprise he understood her. She told him that he had just "spawned", and that this happens to everyone, and that she remembered her first time she spawned. After getting him dressed and ready to go, he asked where he was.<p>

"Why, The City of Notch of course!" she said enthusiastically as she pointed to the sign above the door. Welcome to Notch City! it said. He didn't have to learn how to read, he simply knew it somehow. My name is Isaac he thought. She led him through some clean iron hallways with no windows. She said, "Before we can get you to be a part of society, we need to test you first. Everyone needs a job, and we need to find out what you'll be best at!"

After testing him with a series strange objectives: "Pick these up and place them there in this pattern. Explore this dark room to the best of your ability. Plant these seeds" they came up with some results. "Well," said the lady "Your vision is too dull to explore caves, and you aren't too apt at building. Your farming is alright, but that's a job too careful to be less than excellent. You'll be a meat cooker."

After a few insignificant tests and walking through more clean hallways, they lead him to a pair of Iron double doors. The guard looks at him, sympathetic, and says "Enjoy your stay at Notch City" as he presses a lever.

The doors open.

At first the light from the square sun is too blinding for him to see anything. He squints and takes a look around. The city is amazing, and seems to stretch on forever in every which direction, even down and up.  
>Streets are built extremely high up into the sky, and all the buildings are a futuristic mix of Iron and Diamond Blocks. Redstone wires spread around along the buildings every which way. He looks over the railing of a busy walkway. He can't even see the ground. The surrounding buildings stretch down into ominous darkness. "Don't look down" says his escort. "No one comes back from falling down there."<br>"Do they hit the ground?"  
>"Don't say that word."<br>"Ground?" People walking near them looked at Isaac as if he had just punched someone.  
>"Listen," said the escort, "there's two rules here: One, don't say ground. People don't like it. Two, do your work. Do as you're told and you'll be fine."<p>

They stepped into a multi-passenger minecart. The escort pressed a series of redwire switches and the minecart took off through a series of glass tunnels that wound between the labyrinth of tall buildings. They stopped at one with a giant blocky picture of a porkchop on its main wall. Isaac got off the minecart.  
>"Welcome to your new life." said the escort, and his minecart sped off.<p>

"Why is it forbidden to say ground?" Asked Isaac one day to his working partner, Matthias. Matthias was a tired-looking fellow, but well built. He should probably be a miner, thought Isaac, not a meat cooker like me. "No one has seen the ground in hundreds of years. Some people just forgot what it was. People don't like to be reminded of a past they're unfamiliar with."  
>Issac thought for a moment. HE didn't even know what the ground was. He just knew it should be there.<br>"Every new spawner, like you, has all these notions of 'the ground', but they quickly fade away."  
>Isaac refilled his furnace with some more coal.<br>"Do YOU know what the ground is?" He asked.  
>"Yes." Matthias answered.<br>"How?"  
>"Because I've been there."<br>He said no more on the matter.

Isaac had learned a couple of things from his first few weeks in Notch City. First were the job classes. The lowest were cookers, and next were the smelters and then the farmers. These were the majority. The builders were the next high up; they were actually allowed to use tools and manipulate the environment. Then came the redwire technicians, as they required a high level of intelligence, followed by the miners. Not only were they allowed to access the mines (which nobody knew where the mines actually were), they also had the use of the most powerful thing of all: The crafting bench.

Rumor had it that there was only one crafting bench in existence. Only the highest level person in Notch city was allowed to use it, and he used a complex system of minecarts and redstone to manufacture all the tools to wherever they were needed. And since the tools were made of a durable mixture of iron and diamond, the job wasn't too demanding.

Weeks passed, which turned into months. Isaac was talking more and more with Matthias and had been able to gather some information on the ground. It was speculated that the ground was a solid surface that encompassed the entire planet - a thought that was too strange to comprehend at first. People kept building and building, and more people kept spawning, that after years beyond the mind's comprehension, the ground became packed and cluttered. Add to that the number of "griefers" (people who went insane with the clutter and tried to clear up the ground by destroying things) that kept spawning, and the place became a wasteland. Back in those times, anyone could make their own crafting bench. Armed with this, some simply moved underground and it is unknown whether any still live there now.

Amidst the chaos, a new person spawned. He called himself Notch. He could not be killed. He said that there was plenty of room up above, and that no one had to live in the greifed wasteland of the ground. With this new hope, he managed to pull everyone together and build a new, orderly society above all the wreckage. And the society grew peacefully, and (as everyone does one day) Notch disappeared. What he didn't forsee, however, was that the buildings would keep growing and growing as more people spawned. Eventually, the society had shifted so far above the ground, that they had forgot what the ground even was.

The Ground:

A year passed. Isaac had learned all that he could from the ground from Matthias. He would not explain why or how he had been there before. Isaac lost interest in it eventually. Afterall, what would a blocky wasteland hold for him anyway? He just settled back and followed the two rules.  
>One Sunday off of work, Isaac decided he wanted to go for a walk and try to explore as much of the city as he could. He walked down from his apartment, through some clean iron hallways, and left the building. The city was very good looking. There were mini parks with fountains in the middle, but no trees (they were made out of wood, afterall) and no one dared to destroy any blocks with the guards standing around almost everywhere. Your fists couldn't compete with their bows and swords.<p>

The only trees Isaac saw was in a far off building, accessible only by minecart. It was made like a giant glass dome with what looked like a forest inside. Isaac would sometimes see a worker chopping one down, or another one planting a sapling. They were heavily guarded, and probably not even told the recipe for a crafting bench. They probably didn't even care, either. The guards would kill anyone trying to make one on sight.

He kept walking and walking, and taking random minecarts to unknown destinations. The city was bigger than he had ever imagined. It just kept stretching into the distance, no matter how far Isaac went. And it was busy, too. Just how many people were in this place?

By chance he walked past the spawning building. A woman was being escorted out. She looked confused, and kept trying to destroy the blocks she passed by. Of course, everything was made of either Iron or Diamond blocks, so she didn't get far. Her escort simply helped her into the next minecart, and they sped kept walking. Night began to fall, and had always felt uneasy about night for some reason. Almost everyone did. He began to walk home quickly, taking the appropriate minecarts to get back home.

Except one wasn't arriving on time. After a while, the people waiting for it simply went away looking for a new one, uneasy that the sun was quickly setting. But this was strange. Minecarts were always on time. Isaac looked into the glass tunnel from which the minecart would travel through. Nothing. He wondered where they would take you if you stayed on one minecart throughout its entire ride and never got off. Eh, he thought and started to follow those who had left. But they were already gone. And night had already fallen completely.

He started to feel sick and scared. Night time did this to him although he didn't know why. And he didn't know how to walk home from here. And everyone was already locking up their doors and going inside. He ran down some unfamiliar streets. Visibility was getting low, and people were putting out their torches and lanterns. He unknowingly stumbled across a construction site, and his next footstep fell through the air.

No one heard his scream as he took a sickening fall thousands of meters down...  
>And no one heard the splash that ensued a full minute after he fell.<p>

Isaac opened his eyes. He was underwater, and sinking fast. He swam upward frantically and finally broke the surface. He took several relieving lungfuls of air, and quickly swam to solid ground. It seemed that the water saved his life, and strangely enough, not caused him a bit of harm when he hit the surface. He stood up and looked around. In his limited visibility, Isaac could see that this place was a real mess. Random blocks were placed everywhere with no logic, aside from the bases of the giant iron buildings that stretched up into the night sky. He heard something walking along a small patch of grass directly behind him, and decided that he probably shouldn't stay here much longer. That uneasy feeling he got from night time was fully formed fear now.

He made his way in the dark, weaving his way through the random jungle of cubes, often ducking under brick or wood blocks in order to keep going. There was something making noise behind him. He moved at a faster pace, and arrived at a clearing. The thing following him must've stopped making noise because he couldn't hear anything. Isaac strained his ears, as his eyesight was little help in this darkened environment. Something very subtle, like a string being drawn.

TWANG!

Isaac instinctively ducked as the arrow flew straight over him and stuck itself into the wall to its left. "Holy sh-!" He didn't finish his sentence as another arrow flew past and took a fragment of his shirt with it. He broke into a run. He went as fast as he could, awkwardly making his way through the mess of blocks. There was something up ahead, though. Light. He made his way toward it as fast as he could. A simple torch, sitting there on a pillar of cobblestone. The blocks here were denser than before. It was a dead end.

Isaac struggled to catch his breath as he looked to where the thing had been chasing him. A skeleton's head became illuminated as it approached.

TWANG!

Isaac flinched - but the sound didn't come from the skeleton. An arrow flew past him and buried itself into the skeleton's head. It crumpled down into the dirt. A large black man appeared with a bow in his hand. He took a look at Isaac and chuckled.  
>"Heh, we haven't had someone new in years."<br>"Not a live one anyway" said an other, with a slight British accent. He was tall and also seemed to come out of nowhere. As he walked over and picked up some arrows from the dead skeleton's body, he said "Most never survive The Fall. Especially during the bloody night time." He grinned.  
>"What's your name, boy?"<br>"Isaac."  
>"I'm Thomas. This is Lawrence." He gestured toward the man who had just saved his life. He offered a nod and said "We're still in danger, Thomas. Let's get to safety."<br>"Alright. Isaac, consider yourself lucky. Not only did you just survive a goddamn skeleton attack, but you've also stumbled across the oldest society in Notch City."

They led Isaac around the dense cluster of blocks, through some tight squeezes and came up to a door. Lawrence stepped forward and opened the door, letting Isaac see the inside.  
>"See what I mean?" asked Thomas.<p>

What from the outside looked like a meaningless tight cluster of blocks, was actually the entrance to a crude but fairly big shelter. Various men and women were sitting around tired, or sleeping on cloth furniture. Some huddled around a fire in a fireplace made from mismatching brick and stone blocks. Whoever built this place had really taken advantage of the random blocks already there. Torches lit some lopsided hallways that stretched into unknown places, and everything seemed as mismatched as possible. But despite its randomness, the place felt warm. Comfortable, almost. It was a refreshing change from the endless Iron and Diamond blocks of The City.

They led Isaac inside. As they walked past a couch, Lawrence tossed his bow onto a man sleeping on the couch. "Breaktime's over Marcus, my shift ended when I saved the new guy's life."  
>He immediately stood up.<br>"New guy?"  
>Everyone that wasn't asleep looked in their direction.<br>"Let's sit down, Isaac."

They led him to the fireplace. Isaac sat down on a stone block. The warmth was welcoming, Isaac didn't realize that he was shivering until now. His clothes were still wet from when he fell thousands of feet into the pond. Thomas ordered someone to get him some new clothes while they talked. People were gathering around the fireplace to see what the new guy looked like. Illuminated by the firelight, their faces were dirty but bright with life.

"Welcome to The Ground." Said one of them.  
>"Where'd all you guys come from?" Asked Isaac. "You couldn't of all fallen into the pond."<br>One of them laughed. "Many of us have. There are a lot of large bodies water here. Sometimes we get tired of living the depressing city life and jump. Some survive and some don't."  
>"A lot of us were miners," said a large man with muscular arms. "Like me. They never tell you that the mines are below the ground. Sometimes when the guards aren't looking we manage to explore and find our way to the surface."<p>

"The oldest ones of us," said Thomas, "lived underground before everyone decided to move up there. When they finally resurfaced they found that everyone had forgot about them. Instead of going up there with them, they decided to stay here."  
>"Why don't you guys just build up? There's plenty of blocks around for you to build some stairs or something." "You don't understand. Most of us hated the life in the city. Doomed to waste our life away with monotony. We were like bloody prisoners."<br>They all nodded. Lawrence spoke up.  
>"Sure, life may be hard here, but it sure as hell is better than staying up there. Monsters and all."<p>

Isaac thought for a second. It was true. Life on the surface was bland and depressing. But he wasn't sure about staying here, nearly getting mauled by skeletons each night. The man returned with Isaac's clothes. Lawrence argued with Marcus, the guy he woke up, about who's shift it really was.

"Alright." Said Thomas, standing up. "We've got a big day ahead of us. We should go to sleep. I'll show you to a room, Isaac. We can explain more tomorrow." He led Isaac down some hallways and stopped at a door. There was a sign next to it. Matthias it said. This was the former room of his working partner.  
>"No keys or anything." Thomas said as he opened the door. "No one steals anything down here on The Ground."<br>Isaac walked in. There was a bed and something else. Sitting there in the corner was something he had never seen before. A crafting bench. Would he get to use it?

Thomas walked in and picked it up. As he took it away, he said:  
>"Don't worry Isaac, you'll get a chance to earn your own tomorrow."<p>

Monster Fighter:

Isaac slept long and deep that night, although dreams of The Fall invaded his sleep. Falling and falling: that moment had been terrible. Spinning through the air for so long left him without any sense of direction. When his body connected with the water, it came at an odd angle and had left him disoriented. Isaac kept reliving these feelings until he woke with a start. He halfway expected to be in his apartment in the city, and that this was all a dream. But being here instead made him feel better for some reason. He smiled. At least I don't have to go to work, he thought. He got out of his room and made his way to the room with the fireplace. This place was a sort of lounge, it seemed. Through the small window in the door, Isaac could see daylight. There were a lot of people standing around waiting for someone. A man was walking around and handing out stale bread. Isaac got some and ate it quickly.  
>"Isaac! Glad to see you're awake, boy." Thomas strode into the room, holding a chest. He set it down and opened it. One by one, he pulled out iron swords and tossed them to the people waiting in the room. He tossed one to Isaac, who carefully caught it with both hands. It was a bit heavier than he expected.<p>

"If you didn't already know, Isaac, monsters spawn each night. No one knows why. Usually they burn once they touch sunlight, but with all these damned buildings in the way, only a few slim strands of it ever touches the ground at once. We either have to wait until noon to go outside, or send a party to clear them out first. 'Course we can't waste time waiting for noon, so we go out every morning and do it ourselves. Not to mention that the monsters drop valuable items. We've been missing one person ever since Matthias left, so you'll just have to do."

Isaac looked at the sword in his hands. He held it from the handle and was surprised to see that it felt rather natural in his hand, as if he was always meant to be using this tool.  
>Thomas raised his voice as he pulled out some arrow quivers and bows, tossing them to about half the people there. One of them was Lawrence.<br>"Just a reminder! If you spot a creeper, let an archer take it out! We can't risk it blowing us half to hell."

And with that they opened the door and ran outside. There were about 30 people in all, split up into teams of two. Isaac was with Lawrence. Each person had a bag to put the things they collected into. They took to the south, and immediately there was a zombie walking toward them from the ruins of a brick structure. He had a tattered shirt and dead eyes. Isaac wondered if this was what happened to people once they died here.

"I can't afford to waste my arrows, Isaac. You'll have to take it out while I cover you from up top." Said Lawrence, as he climbed up some blocks to their right.  
>Isaac put aside his fear and ran toward the zombie. He took an upward swing at the its chest, but only managed to inflict a minor flesh-wound. The zombie got closer and tried to grab at Isaac. With all his might, he swung the sword heavily in a downward arc across the zombie's shoulder. The sword cut through and easily cleaved the top half of the zombie's torso from the rest of it's body. Both halves hit the ground limply and bloodlessly. They vanished in a puff of smoke and, strangely enough, left some feathers lying there.<p>

Isaac picked them up quickly, and before he could ask about them he spotted a green creature with a tortured face, four legs, and a longish body walking noiselessly toward them. Those must be the creepers, he thought. He opened his mouth to alert Lawrence, when an arrow flew overhead and stuck into the creeper's head. It simply hissed a little and kept walking. A strange black powder was flowing from where the arrow pierced its skin. Lawrence dug four more arrows into its body with perfect aim, killing it. He hopped down next to Isaac and the both walked over to the powder.

"Gunpowder." Said Lawrence, picking up as much as he could and putting it into his bag. "Let's keep moving."

The came across a clearing of grass. There was a large beam of light illuminating this spot, coming from the sun shining between a gap in the large iron buildings. They walked to the center of the clearing and looked around. A group of three zombies came up behind them. Isaac was just about to run toward them, when Lawrence put his arm in the way. The zombies came closer. The second they touched the beam of sunlight, they burst into flame. They ran around a little and then fell to the floor.

"Don't bother wasting energy if the sun can get them first." Lawrence said.

They continued the rest of the morning much in this manner. Isaac soon found that he was pretty apt at fighting with the sword, as long as he let gravity do much of his job for him. Lawrence would handle all the skeletons and creepers, while Isaac would fight the spiders and zombies. Strangely enough, spiders and creepers wouldn't burst into flame when they touched sunlight. Isaac guessed that only the once-human monsters would do this, although he did not know why. Soon enough, all the groups met together. Once they had made sure that they had cleared their "sector" of all monsters, they went back to the shelter.

Thomas checked all their bags and whistled when he came to Isaac's.  
>"Bloody hell, Isaac. You got this all on your own?"<br>"Yeah. I thought everyone would have as much"  
>Thomas laughed and clapped his hand on Isaac's shoulder.<br>"Not at all, boy. Say, what was your job back on the surface?"  
>"Meat cooker."<br>"Well forget that. Come, I'll teach you how to make a crafting bench. You'll now be considered a monster fighter."

"That's it? That's all you have to do to make a crafting bench?" Asked Isaac after Thomas showed him how to crudely jam four planks of wood together.  
>"You think more people would know it, wouldn't you? They make quite a big deal out of it in the city, but every one here has at least more than one." Thomas laughed. "We all have to earn our way into it of course."<br>"Are you the leader of The Ground, Thomas?"  
>"No, not at all. I'm just the head of this sector. The Ground is split up into many little sectors with their own little leaderships. Our actual leader spends most of her time trying to find a way out of this bloody wasteland that doesn't involve going back to the city."<br>"Why don't you guys just clear up all the blocks? You have the people and the tools to do so."  
>"And risk getting spotted by the city? Think about it, Isaac. They think this place is so horrid that they've decided to forget about it altogether. If we make it obvious that we're here, there's no doubt that they'd take us all back up. Don't fool yourself. Plenty of the officials up there still know what the ground is."<p>

"What happened to Matthias?" Isaac asked, suddenly remembering him.  
>"He was getting more and more uncomfortable with the clutter. He had the beginnings of a greifer, and wanted to destroy every block he came across. Everyone saw it, including him. He slipped away one night and left a note saying that he would return to the city for our safety. A damn shame too; he was one of our best fighters." He looked at Isaac.<br>"See to it that you fill his shoes."

And Isaac did. Weeks passed, and Isaac was being recruited into monster-clearing parties more and more often. He found himself growing stronger and more skilled with the sword. Soon enough, he was the main person you'd want to join your mining group. In the dark, he'd hear monsters coming before anyone else. Built but not overly muscular, he'd quickly take off skeleton's limbs before they could fire a single arrow, and lop off the heads of zombies before anyone even noticed the danger.

When Isaac wasn't with the mining parties or in the morning monster-clearing, he'd join The Scouters during the day. They'd search for anything valuable. Sometimes they'd find an occasional group of pigs, and that night they'd have a feast. Saplings were really rare, and were thought of as one of the highest value objects in all of The Ground.

A full month after Isaac's arrival, they were having one such scouting party. Despite the noon sun shining down on them, it was chilly. It was going to be winter soon. They weaved their way through the blocks. Seeing all the random blocks so often had desensitized Isaac, and now he could pick out patterns amidst the mess of cubes. There were many little shelters here and there, to protect the occasional person trapped outside at night. They were very well hidden. Isaac would never have been able to see them had he not been living here for a month.

The map readers warned that they were entering uncharted territory. They were walking along as usual, when someone shouted that they found something new. They made their way to where the person had spotted it, and it was immediately obvious what was new. It looked like a doorway, but larger and made out of an unknown blackish material that looked familiar, somehow. It was also incomplete; a block was missing on its left side. The remnants of the room surrounding it was full of bookcases.

Jessica, their scouting leader, spoke.  
>"Isaac, what do you think it is?"<br>"I don't exactly know. I think I've seen it somewhere before, but I'm not sure."  
>"I know, me too. Like something from a dream. Try to take some of it."<br>Isaac looked closer at the stuff. It was hard to the touch. He reached into his bag and pulled out his Iron pickaxe. He tried to mine away at it, but it was nearly impossible. It simply wouldn't give way. Something clicked in his head.  
>"I know. This stuff is formed when water touches lava. I've seen it once when I crossed a lava lake with the miners. They poured some over the lava and it got hardened. We've never tried to mine it before. It's too hard."<br>"But diamond is harder, right?" Asked Jessica.  
>"True. I've never thought of that. And why did someone take the time to mine some and build this out of it?" "Let's find out." She looked at the bookcases around her. "All these books are here for a reason. Everyone fill up your bags and let's head back."<p>

Isaac filled up his bag. He took one book out and opened to the cover. The Nether, it said in handwriting. He shrugged and kept walking.

It was nearly dark when they got back to the shelter.  
>"I'll get Thomas," Jessica said, and walked off.<br>Isaac sat down on one of the many sofas in the room and looked at the books he had collected in his bag. They were all journals of some sort. The handwriting looked rushed, and was sometimes unreadable.  
>Thomas walked into the room with Jessica as she finished explaining something.<br>"-found them next to some kind of obsidian doorway."  
>"Alright let's see them, then." Said Thomas.<p>

The members of the scouting party emptied their bags on a table nearby. Thomas walked over, grabbed a book at random, and started flipping through the pages. He frowned with concentration as he tried to read the rushed handwriting. He set it down and grabbed another book. He flipped through it again and again.  
>"These books talk about another dimension. I don't know what to make of it, but I can't read these all. Everyone, grab some books and try to read them by tomorrow. We'll have a meeting about it when we're all finished."<p>

Isaac grabbed his bag and headed to his room. He expected to sleep that entire night, but after he started reading, he didn't stop until he finished them all. This was huge.

The next morning, after clearing out the sector of monsters, they had a meeting. Almost everyone from the sector that wasn't working was crowded around the table in the lounge. They swapped information on what they read and managed to come to a conclusion.

"Alright," Thomas said, "The books were missing many parts and weren't clear. We don't know how this alternate dimension will look like if we manage to get there. But we know how to get there, and that's the important part."  
>A miner spoke next.<br>"But we need obsidian to get there, and we need diamond to get it."  
>"The portal was only missing one obsidian block," Said Isaac. He drew a diagram on a sheet of paper in front of him.<br>"The block above and below it means we can't just make a mold and create some obsidian there. It's only one block, and we'll have to mine it."

"Which brings me to our next matter of business," said Thomas. "We'll need to run a mining op to get diamond. We'll get Isaac and Lawrence to protect the miners while they're down there. Once we do that, we'll find some lava and pour some water over it, get the obsidian block, and complete the portal." He grinned. "I'll find some flint and steel. We can decide who will light the portal if this ludicrous mission ever pulls through."  
>"When do we begin?" Asked Isaac.<br>"Tonight."

Mining:

The most elite members of their sector were chosen for the mining operation. Isaac and Lawrence would protect the miners, which consisted of three men: Ivan, Christopher, and Jackson. The party was small in order to keep things fast and concise. They rested throughout the remainder of the day, and were awoken exactly at sundown. Thomas led the five men to the mining station inside the shelter. They got into a rusty multi-passenger minecart that some scouters had salvaged weeks before. It was old but functional. The minecart rails stretched down into the ominous mine.  
>Thomas put his foot on the back of the minecart.<br>"Make it count." He said, and pushed. The minecart jolted forward and took its 45-degree descent into the heart of the mines. The walls echoed the rickety sound of the wheels grinding against the steel tracks as torches swished past them left and right at a faster and faster speed. Christopher, the head of the operation, leaned forward and swiftly caught a lever with his pickaxe, jolting the old minecart to the right. They continued switching directions in this pattern for what seemed like a mile. They reached a place where the floor of the cave leveled out, and momentum carried them forward.

Isaac stared in awe as the cave opened up to a massive sphere-shaped cavern, lit by torches and lanterns so far away they looked like twinkling stars. He had never visited a cavern this big before . At its very center was a cube-shaped steel building, held there by enormous stalactites that stretched down and kept it firmly attached to the ceiling. The tracks were now suspended in the air, and heading straight for the building.

Christopher turned back and raised his voice over the now-quieting grind of the wheels against the tracks. "This place is an abandoned center of mining for the city. They emptied this entire cavern of minerals long ago, and how we use it from time to time."  
>They arrived inside, and their minecart docked in a spot that looked like it was meant to hold many minecarts at a time. The inside of the building was clean and spacious, and chests were organized into spots built into the walls. It echoed the sterile quality of the buildings in the city, and it made Isaac uneasy; he had grown accustomed to the chaos of The Ground.<p>

Each of the walls had three openings for minecarts to arrive/depart through with a big blue number over each. They had just entered through 3. Christopher pointed at number 12 and motioned to lift the minecart. All five of them easily picked it up and set it on the tracks directly in front of twelve.

"This will lead us into a part of the caves that has been unexplored," Explained Christopher as he got onto the minecart. "But we'll be going so fast that nothing should get us. Just prepare yourself for when the tracks run out, we'll probably have to hop out of the cart."  
>The words hung in the air for a few moments. The tracks seemed old and stretched down into a part of the cavern that was completely submerged in darkness. The torches there must've gone out long ago.<p>

Ivan stretched out his foot and pushed off. The minecart creaked forward and began its descent into the black abyss...

In moments they were completely swallowed by darkness. The heavy blackness seemed to press on them, enveloping them in silence. The only noise to be heard was the metallic clanking of the minecart echoing off the stone walls around them. In their blindness, it seemed to take random and unexpected turns every so often. It would suddenly jolt left and right; the only indication that they were moving.

Isaac felt the fear that he used to get from nighttime creep back into his system. It had been long since he had gotten that feeling, and now his heart was beating in his ears. He couldn't see his hand in front of his face. His hearing got more acute. After he got used to the minecart noises, he realized that there were other things in the background. Footsteps. They'd become louder and quickly die away as the minecart sped past them. The deeper they went, the more noises they started hearing. They were pretty rare at first, only the occasional zombie growl. But soon enough those noises multiplied. Once they heard the iconic 'ssssss' of a creeper right next to their cart, only for it to quickly die away behind them.

And it only got worse. Soon enough, the entire cave seemed to be roaring at them. The noises got so intense and frequent, that Isaac thought he'd go insane if he didn't get off right now. Right when the noise was nearly unbearable, the minecart jolted and got off the tracks.  
>"JUMP OFF!" shouted Christopher.<br>They all threw themselves from the cart and landed hard on stone. No longer on any tracks, the cart's wheels screeched as they threw sparks everywhere. It then tumbled over somewhere unknown, leaving a screeching echo that lingered for a few seconds. A torch suddenly illuminated the scene, placed by Jackson. The light shone off all their sweating faces and provided some visibility. There were lightless torches all along the walls of the cave, which spread out in front and behind them. There weren't any monsters to be seen.

"Isaac, Lawrence, make sure we're safe. Jackson, Ivan, and I will relight all these torches," Said Christopher as he pulled some flint and steel out of his bag.  
>Isaac grabbed his iron sword. He tightened his grip on it as he walked in the direction they came from. A bit of movement in the darkness. He turned to Lawrence.<br>"Did you see that?"  
>"No, what?"<br>"Nothing. Hurry up lighting those torches, guys."  
>Ivan tentatively walked over to them and placed a torch on the wall to their left.<br>"Oh my god."

The torch threw light on a group of about twenty monsters advancing swiftly toward them.  
>Isaac grabbed some dirt blocks to his right and hastily started building up a barrier. All five of them joined him. Some arrows flew past their heads, but they managed to make a wall between them and the monsters. Panting, they slumped against the wall.<br>"That was too close," Said Ivan between breaths. "I've never seen that many together at once."  
>"How are we gonna get back?" Asked Jackson.<br>"The plan is to dig up once it's daylight." Said Christopher, looking at a watch. "Night is about a quarter done. Come on, we need to continue forward."

They started off toward the other side of the cave. The far end sloped nearly straight down about 50 feet. Isaac saw the minecart down there, bent and mangled, illuminated by something out of view. The miners carved out a rough staircase down the shaft, letting them continue their descent. Once they reached the bottom, Ivan walked over and examined the cart.

"The damned thing was old, anyway."  
>"We weren't planning for it to make it through either way," said Christopher, looking at their surroundings. They were standing near a fairly large lava lake, the surrounding cavern dotted with deposits of coal and iron. "We're only here to get diamond and obsidian, so don't bother mining any other resources. We need the pickaxe life to dig back up."<p>

They carved a precarious pathway along the side of the lava lake to continue moving forward. Isaac was sweating from the heat of standing so close to the lava. They finally reached some solid ground on the other side of the lake. It forked into two unexplored tunnels that sloped upward. They placed some torches in their immediate area, and sure enough, sitting there was a sparkling block of diamond.  
>Isaac watched the tunnel on the left, and Lawrence the one on the right. Jackson walked forward and carefully mined the diamond out of the wall.<br>"Woah."  
>He kept mining digging at the hole with his pickaxe, and down dropped four more diamonds.<br>"We'll take the extra two back up to the surface," Christopher said. "Just craft the pickaxe. Ivan, get your water bucket out and pour it over some of that lava. I'll mine the block."

He pulled out his bucket and tossed the water over the area of lava nearest to them. The lava hissed as it cooled and became black and shiny. Immediately, their area got darker without the lava illuminating it. Christopher placed some more torches. He then walked over to Jackson, who finished at his crafting bench, and grabbed the shining diamond pickaxe. He crouched and began to swing it toward the obsidian block.

TWANG!

"Aw hell!" Lawrence shouted with more anger than pain. An arrow was sticking out of his side, and a stream of blood ran down his shirt. Furious, he yanked out the arrow, drew it into his bow, and shot the skeleton down in one swift movement. Isaac quickly cut off a strip of his bag and went to bandage Lawrence's side. As he finished, Lawrence slumped down against a wall and held the bandage to his wound, wincing in pain. A zombie growled directly behind him.

Isaac spun around, sword in hand, and buried the blade halfway into its head. He pulled the zombie in, sword still in its skull, and kicked it as hard as he could. The zombie flew down limply and disappeared into the usual puff of smoke.  
>"How long does it take to mine that thing?" He shouted back at them.<br>"I don't know, this stuff is really hard. Ivan, Jackson, come help me dammit!"  
>They pulled out their own pickaxes and helped mine away at the obsidian.<p>

He had to keep track of both tunnels at once. A spider jumped at him. He took a swing at it and missed. It hit him square in the face and made his nose bleed. He stood back and waited for its next jump. The moment it lunged at him, Isaac thrust his sword straight out and skewered it through the head and out its abdomen. It moved its legs around for a few seconds then stayed still. He tilted his sword down and let it slide off. Again, a puff of smoke.

Blood was streaming down out of his nose. He looked up and saw that more monsters were coming into view. Lawrence took his hand off of his wound, and tried to take a spare shot at one of them and missed. He winced and put his hand back on his bleeding side. Watching the man who saved his life be in so much agony made Isaac's blood boil. He ran to the crafting bench, grabbed the two spare diamonds, and expertly put together a diamond sword.

He roared as he dove into the crowd of monsters and immediately began slashing. The diamond sword flew through the air effortlessly and cut through monsters with ease. Isaac fought with more vigor than ever before. He cleaved off limbs and used them to shield himself from arrows until he killed the skeleton firing them. A creeper got close and as it was about to explode, he grabbed it and shoved it into the crowd of monsters. The explosion knocked Isaac back and blew monster bits all over the area.

"We're almost done!" Christopher shouted. "Jackson, be ready to catch it once we finish. There's probably lava underneath and we don't want to do this all over again."

Isaac finished off another skeleton. He got his old iron sword off the ground and threw it like a spear into an approaching creeper.

"Alright, there!" shouted Jackson. "I've got the block in my bag."  
>"Let's get out of here! Come on Isaac!" Christopher ran over to Lawrence. "Ivan, help me get Lawrence up."<p>

Isaac held back the remaining few zombies as the rest doubled back along their path around the lava lake. Christopher threw the diamond pickaxe to Jackson, who quickly mined out a 2x2 clearing that went into the wall. Isaac ran to them, ignoring the monsters following him, and got into the clearing. Jackson quickly blocked it up with the cobblestone had collected during the trip. They breathed a few sighs of relief, and continued on.

They made a tight spiral staircase straight up and didn't run into anything along the way. Lawrence had to be helped up all along the way which made them move slow. After what seemed like a lifetime of digging up, Jackson finally broke up into the surface. The light nearly blinded them as they climbed out. Lawrence groaned as they helped him up.  
>"It's just past noon. We should make it back to shelter on time."<br>Isaac didn't hear that sentence. He was so tired that he collapsed onto the dirt as soon as he got out.

Isaac awoke in his room. He sat up quickly, and immediately regretted the action; his body ached all over. He was covered with rough cloth bandages all over his arms and legs. A man on the opposite side of his room, Marcus, was sitting on his crafting bench. Looking surprised to see Isaac moving, he got up and walked out of the door. Thomas walked into the room moments later.

"Good, you're awake. We were starting to think you were dead. You look like hell." Thomas said.  
>"How long was I out?"<br>"A good two days. Everyone has heard about how your mining trip went. You're a bloody hero, Isaac."  
>"What about Lawrence?"<br>"With plenty of sustenance, he should be healed right up proper by tomorrow. Although I'm sure he's better than he acts. He gets more food acting that way, the bloody-"  
>"Have you guys finished the portal yet?" Isaac interrupted.<br>"No. We're waiting for The Leader to arrive. We're expecting her here today. Here, drink this."

Thomas handed him a steaming bowl of a liquid Isaac had never seen before.  
>"Mushroom soup. Cures damn-near everything. We don't have much of it, so consider yourself lucky, Isaac."<p>

He drank it down in one gulp and immediately felt better. He slowly got out of his bed and stretched. His cuts and bruises hadn't healed, but he felt like new. Thomas led him out of the room and into the lounge. The monster clearing party was just getting back in.

"Isaac!" many of them exclaimed. They sat down on the various couches strewn about and shared their questions and admiration with him. Isaac was used to getting praise for his monster-fighting skill, but not like this. Everyone seemed downright thankful that he managed to save the lives of their most elite members; the actual success of the mission was more of an afterthought.

Isaac insisted on going with the scouting party that evening. He hadn't done anything for two days, and he didn't like feeling useless. Outside was freezing. A layer of frost coated the ground, and the sky was gray and cloudy, rendering the usually vibrant mesh of blocks a dull and shadowless color. The scout yielded no results, just the usual bits and pieces of trash that the city people above tended to toss over the edge when no one was looking.  
>They continued on for about another hour, until their scouting leader motioned for them to stop. Snowflakes began landing around them.<p>

"Alright, let's head back." Said Jessica. "We haven't found anything useful today, and we don't wanna get frozen out here."  
>The snow started coming down heavier and packed onto the ground. The scouting party turned around and started heading back in the direction of the shelter, their footsteps leaving deep and obvious tracks. Despite the biting cold, Isaac enjoyed the snow. It gave him a calm feeling he could not explain. His contentment didn't last long, however; snow made the ground even more difficult to navigate through. If only they had a better place to live, with more space. Then they wouldn't have to live burdened with the massive clutter that invaded their peace.<p>

As they approached the shelter, Isaac spotted something unusual. There were footsteps in the snow, leading up to their hidden door. As no one usually went outside, except the scouters, this struck him as strange. "It must be The Leader," Jessica said.  
>They wiped the snow off their shoes and went inside.<p>

"You must be Isaac," said a pale white woman with piercing blue eyes and dark hair. She had two muscular escorts with her. "Come take a seat," she said with authority. "We're about to have a meeting."

"My name is Elizabeth." She said. "I'm the leader of the ground." She wore a slightly tattered red shirt with dark blue pants. Her appearance was so common, that aside from her authoritative glance, Isaac would've never guessed that she was the leader of a society like The Ground.

The more important people in their sector sat down around a long table in the lounge. The rest of the people that were present simply gathered around and listened to the discussion that was about to ensue.

"Firstly, tell me all that you know about this new dimension, this 'Nether', you have read about. Your messenger wasn't exactly clear."  
>Thomas answered. "We honestly don't know much about it ma'am. One of our scouting groups found a near-finished obsidian portal next to some books that described a new dimension. We don't know what is in there, or if the portal will even work."<br>"And yet you risked the lives of some of your finest men to complete it?"  
>There was an edge in her voice. After hearing the story about the dangerous mining operation, many were wondering the exact same thing.<br>"You know as well as I do what a new dimension can mean for us, ma'am. Every single one of us is sick and tired of living in this wasteland. A new dimension means that-"  
>"We can finally live somewhere with space," Isaac finished.<p>

The hard look on her face seemed to vanish. There it was. What every citizen on the ground hungered for; a real place to live, with freedom and room to thrive and expand. That hunger was always there within every one of them, calling to be satisfied, although not everyone was aware of it. But now that it was called to their attention, the urge to thrive in a clean land was stronger than ever.

Elizabeth's cold expression returned to her face.  
>"Don't get your hopes up too high. We still don't know if this portal even works, and if The Nether is a safe place either way. And I'm not going to allowing you to simply assign a team to go in there and check it out, like you haphazardly did with your mining op."<br>"Then what do you propose, ma'am?" Thomas asked, "Call and see if dear old Notch City will help us?"  
>Hearing his challenging tone, her muscular escorts took a step towards Thomas. Elizabeth put up a hand and gestured for them to stop.<br>"We'll plan this out, that's what I propose. We'll wait until all of your best members recover and then we'll examine the portal. And if it works, Thomas, you're going in with them. You're not excluded from this mission." Thomas raised an eyebrow.  
>"I didn't intend to be. Whatever this new dimension holds for us, it could never be as bad as where we're living now."<p>

The snow started falling even harder. Along with the deep blanket of snow on the ground, it produced a thick fog that made traveling doubly hard. It wasn't all bad, however. A scouting party had found some easily traceable pig tracks in the snow, and followed it to a fairly large group of pigs. The resulting meat managed to heal up Lawrence and any others who had suffered injury during the mining op within the day. So the next morning, after clearing out the monsters and packing some supplies, they decided to head out for the portal.

Isaac worked on a rough wool coat that had once belonged to Matthias. Just some months ago, he would've never been able to fit into it. But after monster fighting for so long, now he had the build of his meat cooker friend from so long ago. That world seemed so distant, it felt like a half-forgotten dream. I wonder what has come of Matthias, he thought. And if anyone but him noticed that I was gone.

Everyone gathered in the lounge near the fireplace, warming their hands and waiting for the leader to escort them out. There was the mining party: Christopher, Jackson and Ivan; they carried picks, hoes, axes, and about every other tool that could be of use anywhere. With them were the fighters, Lawrence and Isaac, who carried a myriad of swords and bows in their pack. Thomas carried all the food, and Jessica, who only carried with her a compass and a watch, was coming to help them navigate the new dimension with her years of scouting knowledge.

Elizabeth walked into the room with her escorts. "Alright, make sure you have everything in your packs. We're moving out now." Everyone stood up and walked to the door. Elizabeth examined their packs quickly and then nodded. She opened the door. "Everything is good. Jessica will take the lead. Everyone else follow closely behind, as we don't want to lose any of you in the fog along the way."

They trudged through the knee-deep snow and frigid air. The route that Jessica took seemed completely unfamiliar and wrong to Isaac, but surely enough, as they rounded a giant iron base of a building, the unfinished obsidian portal came into view. The clearing looked almost exactly as Isaac had seen it when they first found it; aside from the snow and empty bookshelves.

Thomas walked up to it and put his pack on the ground. He pulled out the obsidian block and carefully slid it into the gap in the portal frame. He reached into his pack a second time and got out some flint and steel. He stood before the portal for a while, flint and steel in hand, his breath visible in the cold. The air was thick with anticipation.

He struck the flint and steel. A spark hit the obsidian and exploded into a swirling purple mist that quickly filled the frame completely. Light and heat flooded forth from the portal, and immediately the snow around them melted. An ominous, ethereal sucking noise filled the air, and any snowflakes that came close were drawn into the portal. The swirling purple had a hypnotic quality, almost beckoning them to come and get eaten by the swirling mist.

Everyone stood there for a while, mouths gaping open at the anomaly before them. One voice broke the hypnotic noise emanating from the portal.  
>"I'll go first." Isaac said.<br>They watched with apprehension as Isaac walked forward, climbed into the frame, and disappeared.

The Nether:

Going through the portal was a sickening experience. As soon as Isaac entered the frame, the world around him seemed to lose it's rigidity. Reality ebbed back and fourth, hypnotically, like the tides of the ocean, faster and faster until the threads of reality finally stretched to a breaking point and then... nothing. For a few moments, existence didn't mean anything. His being was falling through a peaceful void of emptiness for what could have been years.  
>Emerging from the portal was a different matter, however. Plunging into reality, his consciousness hurried to put itself back together, while his body felt like it was being squeezed through a tube of toothpaste. The portal spit him out onto an unforgiving stone surface. Isaac groaned. Nauseated, he made an attempt at sitting up. He bent over and vomited the contents of his stomach onto the stone floor. He felt much better now. Overwhelming heat called his attention, now. Thinking of the others, he shed his wool coat and with it cleaned away the vomit. Wiping his mouth, he stood up and looked around.<p>

Immediately, his heart sunk. This was no place for living. But despite the hellish nature of the scene, this place was awe-inspiring. The Nether was a giant cavernous landscape, made mostly of bloody red stone and lava seeping through fissures in the rock. A glowing yellow substance hung in clumps on the ceiling, while smaller caves dotted the landscape here and there, illuminated only by lava and pockets of fire that burned on the bloodstone.

Isaac was standing atop a canyon that overlooked a giant lava lake to his left, and curved up into the ceiling on his right. The canyon stretched both in front and behind him, tracing the winding shape of the lava lake. Isaac thought he saw a trace of movement in a nearby cave, but decided that it was only a shadow cast by the flickering fire sources around him. He heard a thump behind him, and turned around to see that Thomas had just emerged from the portal. He was sprawled on the floor.

"Bloody hell, Isaac-" he curled up and retched a few times, but didn't throw up. "Help me up," he gasped.  
>Isaac chuckled as he extended his hand. "You have a strong stomach."<br>"I didn't eat breakfast." Thomas stood up straight and rolled his shoulders. He frowned as he looked around. "Damn," he said simply.  
>"Exactly."<br>"I think we've found Hell."  
>Lawrence fell out of the portal. He stood up and breathed heavily for a while, but otherwise seemed fine. They examined their immediate area and helped up the next person that came through the portal. They continued this pattern until everyone was safely out. They checked their bags to see if they had lost anything, which they didn't, and quickly equipped everyone with their respective tools.<p>

Jessica looked at her compass. "This thing is useless here. The needle keeps spinning around."  
>At that moment, they heard a painful, inhuman scream. A giant white creature rose into view. Defying the laws of gravity, its body was square and had several tentacles dangling from the bottom. A horrific expression defined its face. Tears ran down its closed eyes. It faced them, opened its eyes and mouth, and expelled a fireball that headed straight toward them.<p>

Note: I'm changing a few minecraft mechanics here for sake of plot.

Everyone dove out of the way as the fireball crashed into the obsidian portal with a deafening boom. The black frame fell apart and the purple mist dissipated.

"Grab the obsidian, I'll distract it!" Shouted Isaac. He grabbed a loose stone at his feet at hurled it at the ghastly white monster. It struck, but didn't seem to do any damage. It slowly faced Isaac and expelled another fireball. Isaac ran away from where his team was collecting the remnants of the portal. The ground behind him exploded, sending chunks of bloodstone flying over his head.

A crazy idea entered his head. Isaac stopped and turned to face the floating monster. It came closer. From this distance, Isaac could see that it was really quite massive. It made a high pitched noise and expelled another fireball. Isaac held the top end of his iron sword with one hand and the handle in the other so that the flat part would deflect the fireball.

The ball hit the sword with immense force, immediately rebounding off the iron surface and away from Isaac. The sword reverberated and shook in his hands. The fireball flew in a perfect trajectory back into the ghast's open mouth, which had been primed to hurl another fireball. The two fireballs exploded in a brilliant display of light, leaving little more than smoke where the ghast had once been.

I can't believe that worked, Isaac thought. He caught his breath and looked up toward his team. The ghast had blown a hole in the platform where the portal once was, leaving a gap between him and his team. More ghasts floated into view. Their eerie screams echoed throughout the Nether as they approached. "Get to somewhere safe!" Thomas urgently shouted to him across the gap. "We'll meet back here when those things are gone!"

Isaac watched as the team hurriedly gathered their things and ran into a nearby cave in their side of the wall. Isaac looked around. There was a cave, but it was semi high up, and he didn't have a pickaxe. I'll just have to climb. Isaac started up the wall a ways, when a fireball explosion sounded to his left. He hurried his climb and finally made it inside the cave. It was pitch black, but it would provide shelter.

Isaac walked forward into the darkness, keeping his left hand along the wall so he could feel his way around. The cave was hot and damp, almost like he was traveling inside of a living organism. Sweat beaded on his forehead as he strained his eyes. There was a spot of light ahead. He moved toward it. Unclear humanoid figures stood silhouetted around a fire. At first, Isaac thought they were his team, but as they turned their heads to look at him, he found that he was horribly wrong.

What faced him were upright-standing beasts with unmistakably porcine features. Snouts defined their faces, and crude hooves their feet. What made them completely frightening, however, was the various areas of skin and muscle missing from their bodies. Their skeletons were completely visible in some points of their bodies, which was so repulsive it almost made Isaac gag. At their waists hung crude loin cloths, and in their hands glimmered golden swords, looking well worn from use.

He tightened his grip on his own sword and slowly backed away. The pigmen eyed him cautiously. He kept withdrawing and backed right into one of them. It moved him forward, toward the fire, until he was in the middle of their group. Well, at least they weren't attacking him.

Isaac examined each of their faces. The pigmen looked ridiculously sinister with the firelight shining up into their features, the only things that existed in the pitch black of the cave. Though brutish and frightening in appearance, their eyes shined with something Isaac had never seen in a monster before. Intelligence.

Jessica sat and tried to figure out her compass. It was useless. The needle simply wouldn't stay still. It was as if north was constantly picking itself up and changing its position around them. If there was such a thing as north in this hellish place. The entire team had run into a random cave. Flickers of movement were seen, but no danger had presented itself to them. They settled into a small alcove that the miners carved out. The stone seemed ridiculously easy to mine.

Another boom. The cave shook and small red stones fell from the ceiling. The ghast's attack had been relentless at first, firing fireball after fireball at their direction, but now that the entire team was in the cave, the fireballs came with less and less frequency.

Then they stopped. After waiting a considerable amount of time, Thomas spoke.  
>"Alright, I think they're gone by now. Not the brightest creatures. Let's go see what's left of the cliff side we appeared on."<p>

They emerged from the cave. The cliff side was jagged and destroyed, their initial portal spot was completely gone, aside from an island bloodstone that remained floating in that general area. One final ghast was floating about, seemingly confused by the absence of his brothers. Lawrence dropped to one knee and shot it down quickly. The monster fell and disappeared in a puff of fire upon contact with the lava far below.

The miners built a wide bridge to the floating bloodstone island with the blocks they had collected in the cave. They rebuilt the portal with a quick shelter around in order to shield themselves from the view of any ghasts that may wander by.

As Jessica crossed the bridge to the island, she turned to Thomas.  
>"I guess we're not visiting here again?"<br>"No. Not in my lifetime we're not. It's too dangerous to live here for an hour, much less move the entire society of The Ground to live in this hellhole."  
>"What about Isaac? We can't leave him behind."<br>A look of despair crossed Thomas' face. They stepped onto the island. Thomas stepped forward and lit the portal, filling the air with that hypnotic sucking noise.  
>"We'll wait for him here."<p>

They waited. And waited. Not a word was said, for there was nothing to say. Ghasts wandered past, but as long as the team hid in their makeshift shelter they were safe. If the ghasts couldn't see you, it seemed, they didn't care. Hours passed. No Isaac. After what seemed like an eternity, Lawrence stood up. With a look of great sadness, he wordlessly stepped into the portal, and disappeared. One by one, the team members hopelessly stepped into the portal. Thomas stayed steadfast.  
>"He's gone, Thomas. We have to go. You can't stay here waiting forever."<br>"I suppose so." Thomas shook his head. "But I refuse to believe that Isaac is dead. If experience has taught me anything, it's that that bastard doesn't die."

Jessica opened her eyes. Existence breathed into her mind, and it was back to nauseating reality. The crew that had come through before her helped her up. As she tried to gain her bearings, she thought of the trip through the portal. That moment of nonexistence was so frightening, and yet, peaceful. Although portal travel was near-instantaneous, it almost felt like an eternity, floating endlessly through peaceful nothingness. Like death, she imagined.

The sky was clear and the sun was descending somewhere beyond the jungle of tall buildings. Snow still blanketed the ground.  
>"Jessica," Christopher said. "There's something wrong."<br>She dusted herself off and looked around. Immediately, the scouting leader inside of her detected something was wrong.  
>"This isn't where we entered."<br>"And the sun is going down soon." Added Lawrence.  
>Jessica looked at her clock.<br>"We've got about an hour to get back to our sector. My compass is working, so it shouldn't be hard to make our way back. Let's go."

Jessica led the way, following her compass and her instinct equally. Years of navigating The Ground had left her with a remarkable ability to find the right direction every time. So when she saw a familiar pattern in the blocks they started passing by, she steered the group towards it.

"Those must be our footsteps from this morning, look." Lawrence pointed.  
>In a few short moments, they arrived at their original portal site.<br>"This has got to be at least 50 meters from our second portal!" Exclaimed Thomas. "But the one we made in The Nether was nearly in the same spot when we rebuilt it!"  
>Jessica looked at her clock.<br>"We should discuss this when we get back home. We've still got a ways to go, and the sun will be down soon." "Agreed."

When they arrived at their sector, the sky had already gone dark. Elizabeth greeted them and asked why their trip had been so short. They explained about the hellish nature of The Nether, and how Isaac got separated and eventually didn't show up.

"That's horrible." She lamented. "Any good news?"  
>"Well," Said Thomas. "In The Nether, when we rebuilt our portal in nearly the exact same spot, we appeared in a spot nearly 50 meters away from our original portal here."<br>"So if you travel a short distance in The Nether, then you travel a long distance here?"  
>"That's what we think, Ma'am."<br>"Well, this could change everything. But we first need to know the extent of this. We'll investigate the distance tomorrow. The Nether may be inhospitable, but it may lead us somewhere worth living."

A funeral service was held for Isaac the very next day. Burials were unnecessary, as there were never bodies to bury, but memorials were built of two cobblestone blocks with a single torch on the top. They were shining testaments to people who died prematurely due to an unnatural cause, and also served as beacons that lit the way for the occasional lost traveler, or survivor of The Fall. Quite literally, the dead lit the path for the living. Isaac's memorial was built near the (now frozen) pond that saved his life. Those who didn't know him personally came anyway, for tales of the best monster fighter were well spread throughout the sector.

It was a solemn day for the people of that sector. But there was work to be done. Elizabeth ordered Jessica's scouting group to find out exactly how much distance was between the two existing portals. After some careful measurement, and a great deal of estimation, they deduced that distance covered in the Nether was multiplied by eight in the real world. Elizabeth called a gathering that night. Everyone that could attend would come.

The citizens of that sector packed into the lounge. Farmers, miners, and builders alike were gathered together to hear what the leader of the ground had to say. Elizabeth glanced around at each one of them. Little did she know that she would repeat the following speech in every sector of The Ground.

She began:

"Life. The lives that each of us have known have never been good to us. Even within the safe confines of the city, our lives were restricted. Monotonous. We were all doomed to waste away doing the same jobs, seeing the same people and not being able to fulfill our innate desire to grow and prosper as individuals. And although The Ground has offered freedom, if only a taste of it, we cannot afford to live this lifestyle much longer. Others before us have been driven insane by this clutter. Sane people that we considered our friends, turned mad by the incessant disorder of the wasteland around us.

" The earth beneath our feet is well worn out and sucked dry of nutrients. Our crops struggle to grow, and yield only the minimum amount of bread to sustain our population. The monsters that come out each night have been taking the lives of our people for years, and is only worse in our current living area. If this pattern is to continue, life for us is only going to get worse. Our future is bleak.

"But there's a solution. There's a way out. Many, if not all of you have heard about the recent discovery of the new dimension. The Nether. It allows us to travel further than any conventional transportation could ever take us before. Traveling through it is dangerous and hazardous, but it's necessary. Not ev

eryone may survive. And that's why I'm giving you a choice. You can stay here and continue this lifestyle you've grown accustomed to. But if you want to help us in a search for new land, you will have all of your belongings and provisions gathered by noon tomorrow. We will be traveling through the portal then. Make your choice."

Portal travel would be done sector by sector, group by group, starting with Thomas' sector. The first to go was Group A: Thomas, Lawrence, Jessica, Christopher, Ivan, and Jackson, and ten others made up the party. This made 16 people in all, and they were the strongest. They were to carve out a relatively safe pathway through The Nether for the other groups to follow in.

Elizabeth greeted them at the door before they left. She handed Thomas a bag.  
>"This is the obsidian from your old portal. You'll need it to build the new one at the end of your journey. Remember, as you travel, make the pathway as safe and as obvious as you can for the next group. They'll make it safer for the following group, and so on."<br>"The builders in our group have plenty of stone, ma'am." Replied Thomas.  
>"Alright, thanks Thomas. Travel as far as you think necessary to get well out of range of Notch City, then build the new portal. I'll be with the last group of The Ground to arrive."<br>Thomas shrugged. "If we survive. Take care. I'll see you on the other side."

And with that, the first group to brave the journey through The Nether left. The air was frigid, and the snow had frozen into an icy crust. As she took the first few steps toward the portal, Jessica looked back at the mismatching blocky building that had sheltered them for so long. They would certainly never see it again, for better or for worse. It was almost sad.

"Let's get moving, Jessica." Thomas said. Grim determination defined his expression. "No time to mourn our old lifestyle."  
>"Right."<p>

There was no hesitation this time. As soon as the portal came into view, Thomas stepped forward and climbed into the obsidian frame wordlessly. The ten men and women that they were traveling with had never seen a portal, and the ominous noise it emitted froze them in their tracks. There wasn't time for this. Jessica grabbed hands with the nearest person, and told him to do the same with the rest. When they had finally formed a chain of hands, Jessica walked right in front of the portal.  
>"Whatever you do," she said to all of them, "don't let go of the person in front of you."<br>Then she calmly walked into the portal.

Immeasurable time passed, and everyone got spit out the same way they went in: hand in hand. They lied on the floor of the small shelter of bloodstone surrounding the portal. Thomas had already prepared for the surge of nausea, and passed around a bucket for people to empty their stomachs into. Sweat beaded on their foreheads as they gained their bearings and stood up. Thomas took the lead, and they began their travels.

The group ran as fast as they could across the bridge over the lava lake below, and into the nearest cave. There wasn't any ghast activity so far, so they were safe while they placed a sign at the mouth of the cave indicating where the next group should go. They followed through the contours of the cave, placing torches here and there. Flickers of movement were cast as shadows in the darkness as they traveled through.

They traveled and traveled, keeping track of their general direction. The cave seemed endless. Various grunts and primal noises would echo throughout the cave walls, with no seeming origin. It was a full hour before they reached a dead end. Christopher stepped forward and mined a block out of the wall in front of them. He turned his head and listened.  
>"I hear Ghast moans on the other side. There must be a clearing beyond this wall."<br>"Then by all means, mine through it. I don't think I can stand much more of this bloody cave."

He swung his pickaxe and took another block out. Light flooded through the opening as lava immediately poured through. Christopher had only seconds to scream before his whole body was enveloped by the molten rock. As the group jumped back from the reach of the lava, a deafening explosion sounded right above their heads. The roof of the cave was gone, and the tortured faces of several ghasts came into view. It seemed the lava activity had alerted them to their presence.  
>"Get back into the cave!" Thomas shouted.<br>As the team turned around to run back into the cave, another explosion sounded ahead and lava poured down in the way, blocking their path. They were trapped in a trench, lava approaching on both sides, and a group of ghasts right above. One opened its eyes and expelled another fireball that flew directly at them. It didn't hit.

A figure leaped over their trench, right in front of the fireball, and hit away the projectile with a flash of gold. The fireball flew back in an arch and exploded upon contact with the ghast that expelled it. The remaining ghasts were at once taken down by a flurry of arrows that seemed to come from every direction. All the meanwhile, the group climbed out of the trench. They sat on a clearing of bloodstone while the ghasts where finished off.

The figures that saved them approached, and it was immediately clear that these were not human. The pigmen came closer and eyed them with curiosity, and in their midst, battle-scarred and shirt-torn, was Isaac.

The fifteen of them stared in disbelief.  
>"Isaac?" Thomas asked. "Is that you?"<br>For a moment, Isaac looked confused, as if the sight of other humans was impossible. He then shook his head and urgently spoke.  
>"Follow me."<p>

He led them quickly across the open area, with the pigmen trotting at his side. They reached a small square cave entrance in the bloodstone wall. The pigmen entered first, then Isaac, then the group. Upon entry, they found that this cave had been expertly carved out. Rather than the chaos of regular caverns, this one more resembled the inside of an orderly building. Although lit only by fiery bloodstone, big square hallways stretched into the distance, dotted with rooms with pigmen in them. Some sat around fires, their weapons on the ground. Others were hammering crude swords into shape. All of them stared as the team of Group A walked by.

Isaac turned and walked into a medium sized room. It was empty, aside from a single fire in the center, and a two-block compartment in the wall that held a golden pickaxe. Isaac walked over and deposited his sword into the compartment. He turned around.  
>"Please, sit down."<br>Although there was plenty of heat, they all sat around the fire. It was the only source of illumination. Sweat glistened on their foreheads as the dampness of the cave seemed to squeeze them.

Isaac sat down. All fifteen of them stared at him expectantly. He looked at each of them, relief plain on his face that so many of them were well and uninjured.  
>"Did Christopher come with you guys?"<br>Thomas shook his head. "He didn't make it. Swallowed by lava trying to mine out of our cave. We'll miss him." Isaac nodded solemnly. "Same thing nearly happened to me. Why did you guys come back? You surely didn't risk the lives of sixteen people just to save me."  
>The group took turns telling him about their plans, the fast travel properties of The Nether, and their quest for new land.<br>"But let's talk about the real question. Just how in the world did you survive, Isaac?" Asked Thomas. It was the same question on everyone's mind. Isaac smiled. He began:

"When we were separated by the Ghast attack, I took shelter in a cave, as you did. However, aside from my sword, I had no tools or torches. In the blackness of the cave, I traveled forward using the wall to guide me, when I stumbled upon some strange humanoid figures. At first I thought it was you guys, but as you have well seen, they weren't.

"When they surrounded me, I thought I was going to die. We've never come across any neutral creatures like these, after all. But these creatures, they had intelligence. They seemed fascinated by my appearance. They had likely never seen a human before, at least not these pigmen, and seeing someone similar to them must've sparked their curiosity. It sure as hell sparked mine.

"Although I clearly wasn't hostile, they took me by the arms and grabbed the iron sword in my hand. They led me along their network of caves and took me through some of their crude outposts and small bases they have spread throughout The Nether. I assumed that they were taking me to the head of their little clan. But things went south, and through the course of several Ghast attacks, I ended up trapped in a cave with my pigmen escorts. Piece of the ceiling exploded from a fireball, and all but one of them burned to death from the ensuing lava flow from above. They had dropped cooked pork with their deaths, but it was all quickly consumed by the lava.

"I was at the last little bit of my health, iron sword in hand, and trapped in a cave with a creature that could've easily fed me to health if I decided to kill it. Could I murder this creature? They were so brutish and primitive, that it probably couldn't even be defined as murder. I have taken the life of so many monsters before, that this one would be easy. But would I rather live with innocent blood on my hands, or stay there waiting for death when survival was just a few feet away from me?

"The pigman had backed into a corner and stared at me. My intentions must have been plain on my face, as there was genuine fear in its eyes. The fact that this poor creature was capable of fear, and afraid of me told me that I couldn't kill it. I tossed my iron sword into the lava behind me and sat. We waited for the Ghast noises to stop. When they were finally gone, I stood up and started mining the bloodstone away with my bare hands. The pigman understood what I was doing, and started helping. It took a while, but we finally emerged, our hands bloody and battered from taking the stone apart without the help of tools.

"He led me the rest of the way to the main lair and communicated to what must've been the leader. He was so worn away, he was almost all bone. Just like humans are unique with their facial structures, pigmen can be told apart by the pattern of their missing flesh. With a series of grunts and snorts, they must've decided that I was worthy to be part of the tribe. They showed me how to craft a sword from the glowing material on the ceilings, and I showed them how to make a pickaxe with the same stuff. The tools are extremely crude without the help of the crafting bench, but the pigmen rejoiced at the pick nonetheless. Their bases became infinitely better, and I became part of them. And now that you are all here, we can help eachother."

Isaac saw how his crew reacted to his proposal. Having these monstrosities help them on their journey was one thing, but taking them through the portal along side them was unthinkable. They shifted uncomfortably when he had offered up the partnership of human and pigman moments ago, and now Thomas spoke.

"I don't know Isaac. As helpful as they could be, they're not human. They're still beasts." "They're not beasts." Isaac replied. "They're capable of intelligence, and I'm not leaving without them."

Something happened after that fateful moment with the pigman he helped save. They were brothers now. Part of the same tribe. But to the others, the pigmen were just another kind of monster. Perhaps even more frightening. Their humanoid stature was almost a mockery of the human species, and their cautious neutrality made them all the more mysterious. Too ugly to accept, too human to kill.

"They're not stupid." Isaac continued. "Ever since I came here and started speaking to them, they've been picking up the rudiments of language. I don't know why they're trapped here, but I do know that they've been in this dimension far too long. In these rigid conditions and with such little resources, evolution hasn't been fair. They haven't had a chance to develop like we have." His tone was almost sad. "We can give them the chance they need to develop intelligence. To grow and expand like every being should!"

That had struck a chord. After all, it was the whole reason why this journey was taking place, to grow and expand. To deny these pitiful creatures passage with them would be crueler than any wound inflicted by the sword. After talking it over carefully, the group agreed to letting the pigmen travel with them across the portal at the end of their journey.

The first order of business was to clear up the path for the following groups. The Ghast attack had left the pathway blocked by lava, and it was necessary to clean it up before continuing. Group A's miners were escorted by several pigmen to do the job, while Isaac went to the tribe leader. It was an arduous process, trying to communicate with the old pigman, but one thing did seem to spark his attention. Isaac got it out of Thomas' pack.

A single sapling.

Every pigman in the immediate area gathered to see it. The tribe leader's eyes sparkled with understanding at the sight of the sapling, as if the plant echoed some sort of familiarity in the pigman collective unconscious. It must have been generations ago, when that single object had meant so much to them that they could recognize it instinctively. At some unknown time in the past, their ancestors had thrived on the surface. For reasons unknown, fate had been cruel and left them stranded in this hostile land, and they were hungry to return. The tribe leader lifted his eyes from the sapling and looked steadily at Isaac. The pigmen couldn't speak, but their eyes were as clear as any language could be. Take us back to the surface, they pleaded. Take us back home.

The journey would begin the next morning. At least, the closest thing to morning possible in The Nether. Without the universal clock of day and night guiding them, all they could do was sleep until everyone was well rested. The pigmen themselves only slept in shifts. Isaac found it extremely disorienting to live without the periodic order of the sun and moon.

Earlier, when Group A's miners cleared up the lava blocking the path for Group B, the were surprised to find Group B already there. Sitting around were 10 of them, eyes wide with fear at the world around them. They had been arguing about whether they should head back to the portal or keep going forward. "Your trail ended right there!" they had said once they were in the safety of the pigmen's caves. "We thought your entire group was swallowed by lava!"

The groups were merged now, making 26 of them bound for the dangerous first journey. The miners expanded Isaac's alcove, making it big for all of them to sleep in. The two groups exchanged information about their journey well until everyone was about ready to die of exhaustion. Thomas stood and spoke.

"Alright, we've all gotten warm and acquainted. Everyone sleep as much as you can," He wiped the sweat off his forehead. "We resume our journey tomorrow, and with luck, end it tomorrow. I don't want to spend another bloody moment in this hell."

They awoke to a breakfast of stale bread, which did little to cure some of the more injured people. They wouldn't risk eating their cooked pork while near the pigmen. Luckily, Isaac went to the leader, and managed to get enough mushrooms to feed everyone twice. The pigmen had vast amounts of them collected, and gladly gave Isaac more than he needed.

Isaac smiled. With the mushroom soup in their systems, everyone was energetic and eager to begin the journey. Two groups and an entire pigman tribe would be going, and the added muscle was a welcome addition. Instead of the fearful dread they had felt before, a new sense of anticipation was over them. They would be the first ones to brave the journey across The Nether, and cross the threshold to new land. They all knew very well that many of them would die. But even if every soul taking this voyage died within seconds of departure, they wouldn't care, for they gave their life for a greater cause. They placed the next stepping stone in the voyage for freedom.

Everyone was ready, and all the necessary provisions were packed.  
>"Alright everyone," said Jessica, at the head of the group. "Let's go."<br>Thomas drew a pickaxe. "About bloody time."

They started their travels with vigor in their hearts. The pigmen proved to be a vital element of the journey. If the humans had any pent up fear or resentment toward them, their travels together extinguished it completely. Together, they dug right through giant bloodstone formations and built bridges across the largest canyons. They fought away ghasts, side by side, until the danger had passed and the group could continue.

Their journey wasn't easy; very far from it in fact. But every ghast attack, every person lost, and every pigman who died trying to deflect a fireball; it only served to make them more motivated. To make them push forward with more strength. For with every hit they took, they hit back harder. For every person lost, 10 ghasts would fall. Sheer determination provided them with the means to not only overcome any setback, but to power straight through it.

They encountered other pigmen tribes along the journey. At the sight of the sapling, some would immediately join, be it individuals or entire groups, and others would stay adamant in the safety of their shelter. They continued in this fashion for miles, traversing the hostile landscape together. Humans and pigmen, brothers in arms.

They approached a clearing, safe from ghasts. Wordlessly, as if under mutual consent, they all stopped and the portal was constructed. The iconic sucking noise filled their ears once more. It might've been frightening to the pigmen, hearing it for the first time, but to the humans it was the sweetest noise in the world. "Isaac, you do the honors." Isaac stepped in.

~~~~~

The sun shone brilliantly overhead, illuminating the green valley. Clear water cascaded from a waterfall which sparkled in the crisp morning air. Leaves rustled in the breeze as animals roamed freely across the stunning landscape of verdant mountains and valleys. A portal appeared on a hill, next to a single tree. It was there that Isaac awoke. Sunlight filtered through green leaves above him as he shakily stood up. Bruised and battered, he surveyed the landscape before him with awe. Tears welled up in his eyes. Long ago, he had spawned in an obsidian room in Notch City. But it was only until now, emerging from the very depths of hell into this land of beauty, that he felt like he had truly been born.  
>Everyone had been amazed upon exiting the portal. Group by group, each one who witnessed the valley broke into tears when they saw the world around them. The verdant landscape was what they had dreamed of. Elizabeth was there when the last of the groups finally came through. By the time she came through, the Nether was relatively safe. They left the portal up, but they soon forgot about it as the landscape caught their attention.<p>

The nagging hunger in their minds was finally gone, and in its place, peace. We were always meant to live in a place like this, they said. They were all so toughened from living on the blocky wastelands beneath Notch City, that starting a new village was almost easy. The land was fertile and beautiful. Everything was easily harvested, and the locale was rich with all the resources they could ever want. Far from the portal, they settled in the valley next to a waterfall that fell into a medium body of water. It was only fitting for them to name their settlement Waterfall Valley.

Isaac built his home with his own hands. It was simple, but it worked and he was satisfied. He wasn't the best builder, but that was fine with him. He spent most of his time helping others build or mine, involving himself in any minor problem the village may have had. He was well known for his deeds in The Ground as well as his involvement with Waterfall Valley.

As for the pigmen, there wasn't any contention between the two species. Everyone lived together in peace, and after a while, the pigmen's horrific injuries started healing. They started learning language. It became plainly clear that they were as smart as any human, just not as educated. It was The Nether that had caused so much misfortune to such a beautiful species.

Life continued, years passed, and one day Isaac disappeared. Despawned, as they called it. Rather than a funeral, they held a celebration in remembrance of his life. From a scared newcomer to The Ground, to the celebrated monster fighter, and finally to the bridge between human and pigman. For without him, they couldn't have possibly aligned with the pigmen and endured the journey across The Nether. His life was relatively very short compared to others, but it was fulfilling.

It wasn't all good, however. His absence served as a wake up call. This would happen to every one of them, and eventually, the great village in Waterfall Valley would be empty. And their minds returned to their old life. That existence that was so far away, it felt like a forgotten dream. The spawn point was in an obsidian room in Notch City, impossibly far away. "We have to get back there," they said, "We have to find that spawn point and lead everyone back here so they can live!"

It was only months later, in a piece of forest that they had considered unexplored, that they found the old portal. Inactive and covered with vines, hidden atop a hill dense with trees. They had no choice. The air was filled with an ominous sucking noise as the portal was lit once more.

~~~~~  
>THE END <p>


	4. Diary Of A Creeper

The Diary Of A Creeper-Book 1  
>By: jonnopon3000<br>A Letter, To You  
>Good day there Mr (or Ms) Storytime Visitor Person :D<br>I appreciate the visit, and hope you enjoy my story.

I really enjoyed writing this story, but it is by no means finished. I plan the Diary to be a trilogy, and since it is forum-based I can edit and re-do parts of the stories as I choose.

I'd just like to say thank you to all readers for all the support, and thanks to everyone who contributed to the story with constructive criticism, ideas, concepts and names. I really do hope you enjoy reading, and continue to follow the development of this series.

Yours,  
>Jonno :D<p>

Prelude...  
>I was bumbling along one day, looking for my house, and I fell in a pit. I thought it was a dungeon, but things seemed a bit too orderly. I wondered around in what seemed to be an abandoned town, until I came across a chest. however, all the chest contained were some old dusty books. What was in these books, however, was a treasure of it's own. Join me, if you will, and read the diary of a creeper...<p>

DIARY OF A CREEPER

Day 1

I was born. Well, I think that's what happened to me. I was just sort of...there one second. I don't know what came before, but should I care? I don't know. Whatever happened, here I was in this dark world. I was confused - who was I? Where was I? Why was I? Dare I think of the answers to these questions? There was an urge in my body, a ticking I needed to satisfy. This was annoying, agitating, always in the back of my mind - the hunger to end the ticking.  
>I felt an idiot standing there doing nothing, but I couldn't think of anything to do in this scary new world. I eventually decided to start wandering, just wandering around.<br>I began to look for shelter. It's all I could think of. And here I learned my first little piece of information about this world I had come to be in - it is expansive. Land and sea extend beyond the eye's reach, and huge mountains stand tall above the extremely uneven world.  
>Life was all around me. Trees. Cows. Chickens. Pigs. All kinds, making noises and minding their own business. In the hopes to gain some directions, or to just have someone to talk to, I approached a few animals. For some reason, they all avoided me. This upset me deeply, and I figured that someone who looked like me would have no problem speaking to me. I went searching for my reflection, and found a pool nearby.<p>

According to my reflection in the waters of this world, I am tall, green and slim. My 4 legs are very small, and make no noise when they hit the ground. I have no arms or other appendages to speak of. My head looks too big for my body, and my face is a twisted mess of emotion that speaks nothing but woe. No wonder people avoided me, eh? I'm sure my kind will help.

The moment I saw myself I decided on a name: creeper. It's perfect! I make no noise; I move quickly, I blend with the grass around me. I creep, so I am Creeper. Finally knowing myself pleased me greatly, and put a spring in my step.

It was then that I noticed a new kind of movement out of the corner of my eye. This was something I had not seen before; more focussed than an animal - this creature had purpose. I moved closer. I was curious. It had not seen me yet. Upon closer inspection, I observed that this creature had a body similar to my own. However, it had long legs, and only two of them. It also had arms. With these arms it held tools, it dug into the earth. Behind the creature was a tall structure make of stone. I envied the strange being. It could use tools, it had abilities I lacked. I wanted to be it so badly. I moved closer in the hope that it would be willing to communicate.

The closer I got, the stronger the ticking became in my mind, eventually blanking out all thought. The creature noticed my presence and started running away. I was upset, and I wanted to explain that I was not going to harm it. It got a sharp tool of some kind, and struck me with it, backing off quickly. I pursued, hoping to calm it down.

It backed into a wall, confused and lost in the darkness. When I finally got close enough to talk, all I could say was "SSSS". My head grew hot and uncomfortable, as if it was swelling to an inordinate size. A feeling of horrifying satisfaction filled my mind as I felt the ticking end, and the last thing I heard was the creature's yelp.

Day 2

"Oh great. The ticking's back."  
>These were my first thoughts as I stood alone in the field, confused. I was once again in a dark plain, moon above, grass below. Was this the same world? What had happened to me? What exactly was that creature that was so scared of me? Most importantly - what happened? I remembered a hot feeling in my head and a great sense of warmth all over my body. I remembered the expression of fear on the creature's face as the ticking stopped.<p>

As soon as the ticking stopped, I was in the field, asking myself these questions. I had no idea what was going on, but I rolled with it. I did was I was doing before my run-in with the creature - I looked for people like me. Unfortunately, it seems we either fit in very well with this landscape, or there are no more of me.

The animals still avoided me, it was always dark and I was growing quite depressed. It seemed my only option was to find the Creature again, to see if I can negotiate a conversation out of its seemingly violent mind - provided I was in the same world, of course. I looked around for landmarks, recognisable objects which would assure me I was in the same place, and allow me easy passage to the great stone structure - and hopefully the Creature. I saw a particular tree that I had looked twice at before, first for its leaf-covered trunk (I thought it was another of my kind at first glance), then for its ridiculous size.

"Yes, I remember", I said out loud to the darkness, "The structure's that way."  
>I kept walking, and I eventually heard the sound of rock against rock. The Creature was there, digging some sort of black substance from the side of a tall cliff. I tried to be tactful. I did not want to sneak up behind it, so I just waited in plain sight.<br>It looked different, somehow. "That's it! It's wearing things now...some kind of armour." The armour was brown, and looked comfortable - but not very protective. After some time, it finished its work on the cliff face, and turned. It stopped dead when it saw me, and I took this as a sign that I should make the first move. Careful not to get too close to lose my mind like before, I edged closer. twang!

Something sharp flew through the air and hit me in the chest. It hurt quite a bit. I realised I wouldn't survive many of those. The objects kept coming, the pain intensified. I decided it was a good idea to move closer, to ask it to stop. The pain was immense, however, and I couldn't make it. As the final blow struck me, I saw the triumphant look on the Creature's face, and I had one last second to wonder why it was so aggressive, and decide to avoid it in the future.

As the world faded, my eyes brushed the top of the cliff. My heart gave one last euphoric beat when I saw someone who looked exactly like me standing there, watching my demise.

Day 3

I was atop a mountain, looking over the edge. It was still dark. There were still animals around me, avoiding me. But was I depressed? No. Why? Now I knew there were others like me. More Creepers. Death seemed only to be an obstacle in my strange repeating life, so I decided to give up all caution in the search for my brethren.  
>I needed to find them, to at least say "hi" to one.<p>

I set off from where I had been born, and travelled far. On my journey I stumbled across some pretty incredible sights. A tall overhang shooting out from the top of a cliff, supported by one straight pillar that stood firm in the ground beneath it. A great waterfall meeting a lava cascade, creating new land. A huge island in the sky, seemingly supported by nothing at all. All amazing sights, but still not what I was looking for. I kept searching, taking no breaks, never giving up hope.

After what felt like a lifetime, I finally found another one. He stood there, in the distance, staring at me. We both began to move towards each other. It was hard to get my legs to move properly, and my body was shaking with anticipation.

When we met, we both reacted the same way. He seemed as shocked as I was to find another one of us.

"Us".  
>I love that word.<p>

After spending a long time with this new friend of mine, I had discovered that he had experienced the same amount of days as I had, that he had been killed by the Creature as well, and that he had seen something he called the "Sun". He told me that if you live long enough, you can watch it rise, brining light to the land, but he also reported that soon after its magnificent rising you reappear at night, the memory obscured by the mind's impossible reasoning. The prospect of the sun was impossible to imagine - I had only ever known darkness. I needed to see it.

And so we both hid. We found a small cavern atop a large mountain and instead of wandering around and risking running into the Creature; we sat and waited for the "sunrise".

After an age it came. The most beautiful sight I have ever laid eyes on. Natural light flooded the plains beneath us, brought life to the land. If I could, I would have wept with joy - I could never have hoped to see something more incredible. I decided now that even if I died a million times more, I would not be unhappy, for I had seen the sunrise, just once.

This new and incredible sight, combined with the knowledge of others like me, inspired me for a moment. I was planning something big. It still saddens me to this day that I never had the chance to tell my first friend my plan.

Day 4

Dark again. My eyes took time to focus, to pick details out of the night. I was faced by a cliff; grey and bland, but somehow beautiful. I stepped back and craned my head upwards. The moon was just cresting the arch of the mountain, and - wait - what was that? Fwip!  
>I ran. As fast as I could, I ran away from the mountain, away from the Creature and the objects from the sky. Fear like I have never felt flooded my body. Why was I even scared? Death meant nothing more than a reposition, right? Well, whatever it was I am glad of it. The instinct that made me run changed my life.<p>

After a few minutes of running in a straight line, I was sure I was safe. Now I focussed on my current goal, leaving the fear and confusion it caused behind me. I thought only of finding one more Creeper - whether it was the one I met before or not, I needed to find one of us to make my plan work, set the gears in motion.  
>It took ages, but I did eventually see one. This was a lively Creeper, seemingly happy about everything. I had pity on him - I was sure this was his first day, and had not realised the torture of this world yet. Either way, he was good enough. I told him my plan.<br>At first he laughed. He didn't know what I was talking about - to him, "Creature", "sun" and "death" meant nothing. My heart sank when I realised that this Creeper would be of little help in the initial push. I did, however, see at least one use for him. "Find others like us, remember this place, and tell them to gather here."  
>These are the last words I spoke to this Creeper, and with that he wandered off, muttering about how green the grass was.<p>

And so I searched again.

And I kept searching. This vast world, this entire planet that seemed to stretch forever, yielded no results - I could not find another. I always made sure I was going to be able to find my way back to the place I told the other Creeper to gather at - I remembered landmarks, and the still-visible cliff and home of the Creature would provide directions for miles.  
>I became frustrated around sunrise - so much so that I did not stop to take note of the intrinsic beauty caused by the incredible light. I did not want to see tonight go to waste.<br>I eventually decided to return to the gathering place.

My head grew dizzy when I arrived; my first sight was a group of three Creepers, standing there, watching me approach. The happy one was there, along with two others, confused but interested. I glanced up at the sun, and sped my pace when I noticed that it was nearly time.  
>I managed to speak only half a sentence to the others before it was night again:<br>"Welcome to my Creeper Com-"

Day 5

"-munity!"  
>I finished the word out loud to the blackness. A happiness filled my heart. My plan had been set in motion - to build a safe, comfortable Creeper community. Within this community, we would perform experiments to see if we could live for longer, perhaps removing the "reset" altogether. We would probably be underground, as we would be less likely to run into the Creature there. The idea of a proper community would also remove the loneliness that comes with a Creeper's depressing life.<br>There were only two problems with the Community - getting more Creepers to join, and making sure we can all find our way there from wherever we appear at night.

I set off in the direction of the Gathering area, thinking hard as I travelled.  
>Upon arrival, I found four Creepers, eagerly waiting the person who knew what was going on. I told them quickly of my plans to build a safe haven for us, and to attempt to remove the Resetting of our lives. All four cheered with joy.<p>

We wandered around a little, as Creepers do, to find a nice cave to start in. Not too far away was a small sheer cliff face, and right at the bottom was a two-block hole, leading to a small cavern big enough to hold at least fifty Creepers comfortably. There were many landmarks, and the entrance itself was a pretty recognisable point, so we named this the place of our dwelling - "Creeperville".

At the beginning, we realised, it would be slow going - we needed to work hard and build up slowly at first so as not to gain the Creature's attention too early. There were many things that needed to be sorted out - how to live, how to build (and how we were even planning to, with no arms), basic things like how to recognise each other.

This could all be sorted some other time, though - with only four Creepers the community needed more. We each took mental note of the paths we took to get here, and what the surrounding area looked like from many angles and viewpoints. We each then split up in different directions, and spent the rest of the cycle (this is what we had come to call our "segments" of life) looking for more Creepers, and spreading the word.

As the sun hit the correct point in the sky, my body tingled with joy at the prospect of what I had created. All was good.

Day 6

I had reset in a perfect place. Tonight was going to be good, I could tell. I was merely 6 steps from the entrance to Creeperville.  
>Tonight was extremely productive in terms of Creeperville's development. In the interest of getting all the changes in, I have skipped most of the light banter and small events, instead opting to list the main events and changes. So much happened, so little space on the page.<p>

Tonight we made a big step forward. Twenty Creepers turned up at Creeperville, each looking forward to taking part in this community. We original four were announced the leaders, with myself holding the most power (as I had formulated the idea). The four of us were dubbed the "Elders of Creeperville" and it was our job to plan the development, oversee the settlement and keep it in shape. It would also be our job, if the Creature attacked, to organise the evacuation and relocation of Creeperville. As an honorary item, we were each given individual names.  
>My name is Jonno.<br>Leading with me are Duffman, Applecore and Moocman.

Our first order of business was to enlist help in Creeperville. We quickly realised that building or digging with no arms was difficult, and while two very brave Creepers did help us expand by forcing their ticking to end, we needed structure. We searched for most of the night, and eventually found a kindly zombie. This one was not like the others. He was intelligent, and offered us his help in return for safe shelter in the cavern. Apparently, his kind lights on fire when the sun rises, and the pain he suffers as a result every night is unbearable. We took him into Creeperville, and he was so grateful he built the 3 Elders and I an office at the top of the cavern. Inside this office, we could see everything that happened below.  
>Time was running short (we had the zombie dig a small skylight so we could check the sun's position). We would all reset soon, and so we Elders decided to call a short meeting at the bottom of the cavern.<p>

Eighteen Creepers and one zombie crowded at the bottom of the pit, and we stood above them, ready to give our announcement.

"Here after the work of the friendly zombie we have come to call Rugby..." Applecore began.  
>Moocman picked up the line. "We Elders have now a space of control over this cavern."<br>Duffman stepped forward slightly and said "Work will begin tomorrow on houses and water sources for all."  
>And finally I stepped forward and shouted, triumphantly "After careful planning and talks with Rugby, we have estimated that the cavern will be a fully developed living environment for up to seventy Creepers within just sixteen days!"<br>The cheer of the crowd was immense, and the happiness that filled my body knowing that this was all my doing overwhelmed me. All Creepers watched me as, for possibly the first time in history, a Creeper began to weep.  
>Tears of happiness trickled from my contorted eyes, and I thought for all the Creepers below me when the sun hit the right position, and it all faded into another black night.<p>

Day 22

Today was the day. The day creeperville was complete, and open at last to the full capacity of Creeper kind. So much had changed, and everything had improved. The sixteen days since we first brought together this community have gone fast - every day a new idea, every day a new design feature.  
>But today the new ideas end, and we can work on improving our lives as Creepers.<br>I had appeared in the middle of an open field, as usual. In the distance I could see lights, and a new structure of what looked like solid black tar. Out of pure interest, I drew closer to check on the Creature's new progress, to see how the sixteen days had affected its progress in this world (we Creepers had come to assume the Creature had been alive longer than all of us, and could make use of both the day and the night).  
>I found a vantage point close to its home where I was invisible to its wandering eye. If I could gape it's what I would have done at its place of dwelling. What I had seen was but one wall. In all, there was a huge black wall stretching taller than the Creature itself, and a menagerie of different shaped buildings inside the confines. There was also a hole in the ground, that seemed to go down forever. As I watched, the Creature (now dressed in a shiny silver armour) sat in a metal cup of some sort and rode some rails down the hole, disappearing. Sensing the danger was gone, I ventured closer to see if I could enter for a closer look at its home. Upon travelling around the entire perimeter, however, I could find no entrance - maybe the Creature never needed to exit, and liked its peace. I decided to leave - both so as to not disturb it, and to escape the possible danger of it coming back.<p>

I travelled (quite a distance) to Creeperville. Everyone was waiting for me at the entrance.  
>Outside were at least fifty Creepers and ten zombies.<br>At first, we had been quite nervous when Rugby had decided to employ a taskforce of ten primitive zombies to help out. These were like other zombies, and only Rugby seemed capable of controlling them. The supposed danger passed quickly, however, when we realised that if one of them were to harm a Creeper, we could simply end our ticking and be rid of them, telling Rugby to never bring that specific one back. Yes, we Creepers had discovered our incredible power to explode. We knew we could before, but we have found uses for it we would never have thought of if we weren't so focussed on construction. Knowing our abilities had sped along production of Creeperville quite a lot, to the point where we had time to build extra sections we did not think of before.  
>Tonight I harboured a feeling quite similar to the one I felt when we first opened Creeperville. A feeling of change, expectation and great pride.<p>

The other elders and I gathered at the new entrance. A huge hole had been dug into the cliff face by the zombies, and there were now stairs down into the city; it all looked quite professional. I was always impressed by their work.  
>Applecore and I entered, leaving the others with instructions to keep the others waiting until sunrise before they entered.<p>

As I entered I was greeted by an incredible sight. The stairway led down in a spiralling pattern to a great flat plain. 500 metres square, this was absolutely huge. At the edges, great sheer walls raised the roof to 100 metres above our heads. This was intended to provide plenty of building room, and allowed the biggest change to Creeperville - a huge hole in the roof, leading to the surface to allow natural light in during the day, and to allow workers to track the sun and estimate when we will reset.  
>On the North-East of the plain was a small mountain of sorts, built carefully to allow a trench from the ocean to carry a small stream down into a canal that ran round the back and left sides of the great cavern.<br>There were many other buildings in Creeperville - houses to contain seventy Creepers and ten zombies, and one large building at the back to house the Elders and Rugby (who had been accepted as a leader, of sorts, in our community).  
>The most impressive feature of the city was, however, the centre. A huge 60 metre by 60 metre square set into the floor (directly beneath the skylight) housed a small lake, and many trees. This was our park, and the most communal area of Creeperville.<p>

"It's quite something, isn't it" Applecore commented.  
>"Yes, it is, and it will be complete before sunrise...where's Rugby?" I replied.<p>

With that, Rugby entered. He was carrying a very large sack of the final component of Creeperville - glass. This had been created by digging sand from the beaches of this world and leaving it in a dark cave that was built over lava.  
>"I have enough, I think" Rugby said with a strained voice.<p>

He spent the night with his zombies installing the windows into each building, then covering the currently-empty skylight with a layer of protective glass.

Just in time.

We Elders went to our podium, at the back of the Park, and waited for the whole crowd of sixty-seven Creepers and Eleven zombies (including Rugby) to gather in the field.

Just as the sun crested the mountain we had built the city into, and light began to pour through the skylight and bring vision to the world, I stepped forward, the other Elders behind me in a arrow-head formation.

I said, in a euphoric voice, the most important thing any Creeper had ever said.

"Welcome...to Creeptopolis!"

And with that, the light flooded the cavern, lit every detail. The crowd cheered, and as I began to feel myself reset, my eyes scanned the city, taking in every detail.  
>"I've done it"<p>

Day 23

"Where am I?"  
>I blinked several times, but could not see anything whatsoever. I panicked and called for help, but heard no reply. Was I alone? Where was I? Why was I not on a flat open plain like I normally was?<br>I tried to move. It felt strange because I couldn't see anything, but I managed it. I mapped my surrounding by bumping my body into the walls.  
>It seemed I had found myself in a very small room with jagged walls and one exit. It was pitch black, and I was deliberating taking the risk of going to the exit. "Am I the kind to take risks? I did take the risk on Creeptopolis..."<br>I eventually decided to walk on. Slowly but surely, I found myself outside the room and in what felt like a narrow corridor. I followed it along for a while, breathing lightly and making as little sound as possible.

That's the first time I heard it.

The voice.

Calling me into the distance.

A light appeared at the end of what I now saw to be a very precisely dug corridor. The end of the passageway seemed to be a precise hole of some sort, with light radiating from the deep.

I looked back to where I had come from. It was still pitch black, and I couldn't imagine staying there, so I pressed on.

"Come to us..."

I shivered deeply as the ice voice floated through the narrow passage, but I continued regardless. What other choice did I have? When I reached the end, I was greeted by a huge cascade into a 1 metre square hole. Torches lined the walls of the cascade, begging me to go down. I did so.

I tried to look down through the hole before jumping in, but it was as dark as the room I had appeared in. I shouted into the cave. "Hello? Who's there?"  
>I got only "Come..." as a reply. The same icy voice. I heard some sort of click after it, this time...like two sticks being rattled together.<p>

I jumped into the blackness...

~~~~~

Thud.  
>I screamed, "Hello?"<br>"Hello..." came the icy, slow reply.  
>With that, torches lit in sequence, revealing a large room, perfectly square.<br>In one corner was a special torch...it was red. It seemed obvious that I should follow it.

After around ten minutes of walking, I saw movement at the end of the corridor. I stopped dead - this was something very quick and very thin.  
>I inched closer, whispering another cautious "Hello" to the blackness.<p>

BOOM!

The end of the corridor exploded with light! Revealed now was a huge cavern with torches all over the place. In the centre was a podium of sorts, and atop it was a being unlike any I had seen. He was as tall as I, but grey and looked as though he was made of sticks. His body was so bright it was hard to focus on him, but I could easily make out two legs, two arms and a head. In a way, he looked like a stripped down version of the Creature we Creepers were all so afraid of.

I did not know how to act - should I be scared, or welcomed? So I just stood there, still as a rock.

"Come closer..." the Icy voice reverberated around the cavern, as if it was not coming from the being itself. He spoke very slowly, extending "S" and "R" sounds.  
>I did as I was told and it moved, walking so swiftly it might have been drifting off the ground.<br>Within moments it was in front of me, and speaking.  
>"I am skeleton...you are Creeper..."<br>I blinked. It's all I could do. It was as if it had me in a trance.  
>"We are the same...Human avoid..."<br>I just nodded. There was little else I could do.  
>"I create...I combine..." and with that, he threw his arms up into the air, showcasing his creation.<br>"You did this!" I nearly shouted.  
>"Yes...I show how..."<br>Suddenly, we were in a small room. This had one tree in it, and some weird wooden block in the corner. Beside it was another block I had never seen - it looked like a piece of rock...with a hole in it. Finally, the centre point to the room was some sort of brown object with metal corners. I was quite confused.  
>"I take..." he said, pointing to the tree.<br>"I take other..." pointing to the brown object, which he led me to. It turns out it was some sort of storage device, for when opened, it revealed a menagerie of items I had not seen before.  
>"I combine..." he whispered, now taking me to the wooden object. He placed some items on it in a strange pattern, and then waved his arms. I blinked, and I must have missed something for the next thing I knew, he was holding some sort of rounded object.<br>He put some more items down, and then waved his arms again. This time, he had created a strange pointy straight object with a feather on the end.

He raised both the items to me.  
>"Bow..." he said, pointing to the rounded object.<br>"Arrow..." he said, pointing to the straight object.

He proceeded to put the Arrow in the Bow, pull back on the string, and let go. The Arrow flew through the air and hit me in the chest, and I recognised the action and pain from when the Creature had hit with a flying object all that time ago.

I felt the world fade. As it faded, I heard his cold laughter and then the words:

"I see you...again..."

Day 24

Darkness surrounded me. I was so confused - had I not reset? I had felt the world fading, and normally after that I see a flat plain or at least know I have reset. This was different - darkness surrounded me in vision, in thought and in body. I couldn't sense anything, I couldn't feel anything.  
>As I pondered on this strange occurrence, light flooded into my vision. It appeared I was in some sort of room, different to the one I was in before.<br>"So I have reset correctly...what's that?  
>I was referring to a very strange blue box in the centre of the room. It was designed like a mesh, and had something inside...a burning Creeper! I could have wept. Who had done this to one of my brothers? What kind of magic was this? More importantly, why was I here?<br>I looked around the room, finding nothing but flat walls on either side, a green-grey floor, the blue box and a brown one similar to the one I had seen in the "Skeleton's" lair.  
>"Could this belong to him? Where is he?"<br>With that thought, a hole was burst in one the wall opposite me, and the Skeleton walked in - again so swiftly that he might have been floating. He drew close, stopping behind the blue box.  
>"You...Reset...Box...Resetter..."<br>I couldn't understand what he was trying to tell me, and just stood there.  
>Apparently noticing my confusion, he tried again.<br>"Box...keep you here..."  
>A light sparked in my head. This strange box...the "Resetter"...it allowed us Creepers to return to one place! This would be extremely useful! I moved closer to inspect the object, to work out how to remove it and take it with me, but I was met by the harsh slam of a sword on the floor in front of my feet.<br>"I...take...you...follow..."  
>"You want to help me?"<br>"Yes...we are same..Human avoid..."  
>"Okay, if I take you to my home, will you help us?"<br>"No...take...I lead..."  
>It seemed that he either knew where he was going, or wanted to take me somewhere. I followed politely. On the way out he struck the box hard, extinguishing its flame and eliminating the Creeper inside. He proceeded to pick up the materials.<p>

After what seemed like an age of walking, we came out into what looked like the inside of a pyramid. On the walls were decorations of some kind, each a different design encased in wood. They were strangely pleasing to the eye.  
>The Skeleton moved to a brown storage box, and took some items.<br>"I...Farash..."  
>"That's your name? I'm-"<br>"Jonno...Jonno is your calling...follow..."  
>I followed again. I was finding this entire trip quite strange. I didn't know how to act or what to do, so I just followed. It seemed at least like this creature...Farash...was friendly and wanted to help out, and any help was appreciated.<p>

Again, after an age, we were at an entrance to the surface.  
>"What...direction...Creeptopolis?"<br>I was slightly taken aback when he said the name of my creation - how did he know? For that matter, how had he known my name? This creature seemed to possess incredible abilities.  
>Out of interest - and to test these apparent abilities - I told him the wrong direction.<br>He proceeded to move his arms in a strange fashion, and we were suddenly at the entrance to Creeptopolis. I was astonished.  
>"No lying...to me..."<br>"How did you do that?"  
>"Secret...ancient secret..."<br>I said no more.  
>"I...teach...I..help...let me..in..."<br>"Wait here a moment, I'll check everything's ok..."  
>I walked inside Creeptopolis, greeted by the sight of sixty or so Creepers and ten zombies gathered in one place.<br>The three other Elders stood on a podium. They seemed to be in the middle of something.  
>"Hello! I have something im..." I slowed down. All eyes turned to me and tracked my movement down the stairs.<br>Then they cheered. The cheer was immensely loud, and I didn't understand what they were cheering about.

When I reached the bottom I was greeted by the Elders. They had all been worried about my absence yesterday, and so I explained what had happened to me. Their eyes opened wide with wonder as I described Farash and his strange abilities, and they hurried up the stairs to greet him.

He was let into Creeptopolis with all the welcoming spirit of sixty Creepers. He taught Rugby to "craft" and how to "smelt", and he built a shrine in the middle of the park with the blue object on top. He explained that we would now reset in Creeptopolis, without missing the day time.

"You...are...free..."

He gave us two more gifts - a "Chest" (the brown storage box) full of tools, and an abundance of a strange red material he called simply "The Dust". He explained that it had special properties and that we would learn "in time" how to use it.

We Creepers could not thank this creature enough. We wanted to know more about him, learn his secrets, everything. So we asked him to stay in Creeptopolis.

"Let me...ponder..." was his nervous reply.

Before he could respond, everyone in Creeptopolis turned to the far wall, listening intently for the strange sound hailing from its direction:

Thud. Thud! BANG!

Fear spread through my body as I gazed through the mist, and felt myself resetting...

Day 25

Before I write this entry into my Diary, I would first like to note that I do not know whether to call this entry "Day 25", or "Day 24.5". The Resetter in the middle of Creeptopolis had caused me to reset mere seconds after I had faded away, meaning it was day time, and not a new day for me...technically. From here on in my Diary, I will find some other method of labelling the time.  
>Chaos.<br>Creeptopolis exploded into terrible chaos.

It started with a single explosion - I remember wondering if a brother had exploded in defense. Screams ripped through the mist, now surrounding all Creepers in the city. No one knew what was going on - we could only each stand and hear our brothers fall.

I remember when I first saw them.  
>"Them!" I remember thinking. My body became numb as four near-identical Creatures, or "Humans" as Farash had called them, spread out in front of me. They all bore the same pointy object that had once killed me, and I backed away. They seemed to be after me specifically - this raised so many questions.<p>

"Do they know about Creeptopolis? How do they know, if they do? What are they doing? Why are they after me? Why are they after me?"

They closed in. The mist had cleared, and I could see many Creepers cowering on the plains of the park, all looking to me for support. One Human saw the Resetter, and walked over to it. He removed the block underneath it, and lifted both it and the Resetter, carrying them in his arms.

"No!" I cried inside my head as the sickening realisation of what they planned set in.

I turned to my Creeper bretherin - the three other Elders were there, unable to move. I looked down at them all, and shouted "I will be back!" They just stood there.

Fwip!  
>The farmilliar sound of a Skeleton's bow passed my head. One of the Humans - the closest to me - fell to the floor in pain, an arrow protruding from his chest. He said something in a garbled voice, and then disappeared. The Humans looked uncomfortable - they could not see Farash, and were afraid of the arrows striking again.<p>

I heard a battle cry from behind me. Farash launched through the air, striking one more Human down with a pointy object and landing in front of the other two. He said something in the same language they used, and proceeded to strike one in the chest with the pointy object.  
>The Humans must have been too shocked to react, for the last remaining just stood there, as full of fear as myself and my Creeper bretherin on the plains.<p>

Farash relented one final word to the Human, and spun quickly. I do not know what he did, but by the time he was facing me again, the Human was no longer between us.

He now spoke to me in words I understood:

"I...stay...Human...protect..."

He walked away with the Resetter, and placed it back in its rightful place.

The whole attack had lasted less than five minutes - The sun was still only just setting.

The silence in Creeptopolis chilled me to the bone.

26th Night

The silence had lasted 'till sundown. We had all reset back into Creeptopolis at the end of the day, which was a strange feeling. We reset in exactly the same place we had been standing before, which was nice I guess. It was just like blinking.  
>The reset only served to make things more awkward. We stood there, in our individual places, completely unable to think of what to do now. Creeptopolis had been found - and not just by the threat we thought we faced - by many Humans.<p>

It was this revelation that chilled us most, I think. The thought of four of the creatures we considered all-powerful, four who knew where we were!

No one in Creeptopolis was unmoved.

At the advent of the moon, Applecore approached me. He spoke in a solemn tone, and I knew he bore a terrible thought.  
>"What now, Jonno?"<br>"I don't know, my friend. We need to call a meeting, with all the Elders...and we need Farash to be there."

And so it was done. We Elders met with Farash, to devise a plan.

After what seemed an age of talking, Moocman summed it up for us.  
>"Two options face us, company. We must either flee from Creeptopolis, never to return, or we must build a strong line of defense."<br>"The advantage of fleeing would be safety from the Humans, at least temporarily." I said.  
>Duffman interjected - "But the disadvantage is that if we do try to rebuild and the Humans find us and attack early, we will be in an even worse position than we are in now to defend. This was only luck, after al..." He nodded at Farash, who nodded back.<br>"Ok then, so the advantage of building a line of defense is obvious - we already have something to build on."  
>"But", Applecore said, "We would be staying in a position that the Humans are aware of, and we would be subject to relentless attack."<p>

So this is where we were. Two suggestions, neither particularly advantageous.

I turned to the Skeleton.  
>"Farash, you haven't said a word this entire time...what do you think?<br>"Human avoid...Creeptopolis abandon...rebuild quick...I help from start..."  
>"You really think we should move?"<br>"Yes...human...avoid..."  
>I trusted this age-old being. He seemed to know what he was speaking about.<br>"We must address the people of Creeptopolis"

We called a meeting in the usual fashion - we stood on our podium, this time with a new addition, and the Creepers were below. We each spoke in tandem, the same way we did on a much more glorious day not too long ago.

I began. "We Creepers tried, we tried so hard..."  
>Applecore continued - "We tried to live in peace, in safety and in hope."<br>Moocman spoke next. "The recent attack tells us that we failed." The mood in the crowd dropped dramatically.  
>Duffman spoke the penultimate line - "But Creepers here me, for there is hope!"<br>And finally, Farash: "Creeptopolis...move...tonight!"

With Farash's last line, the mood picked up in the crowd. Murmurs spread through, and a buzz filled the air.

Farash had said it perfectly - we were moving, and the work began tonight.

26th Day

By the time we reset for the daytime (reference - when the sun had hit the top of the sky), we had prepared to move. Farash had done most of the work - collecting raw materials; salvaging what he could from the homes and the buildings; gathering the Resetter. He told us it was important we move quickly and place the Resetter before the time at which we reset, or face resetting in random places at the wrong time, like before we had even heard of it.  
>The Elders and I announced to the Creepers around the time the sun began to set that we were ready to leave. With hope in their stride, Creepers filed up the Great Stairway and out the exit. It was a depressing sight, an empty Creeptopolis, but I knew its perils would not be in vain. I asked for one moment alone with the haven I had created before I left. The other Elders left.<p>

"Goodbye, Creeptopolis." I called to the emptiness.  
>As I turned to leave this place, possibly forever, I heard something I did not expect to hear - the city had said "goodbye" to me! I reeled in shock - this could not be the case! My eyes searched, and found something believable. A lone creeper stood on the podium in front of the park, looking up at me. The firm set with which he was standing told me he was not leaving. I thought it best not to argue - if this was his choice, then so be it. I will not dictate to my kind.<p>

And so we left Creeptopolis. The first creation of Creepers in history had been ransacked and ruined by a band of just four well-prepared Humans.  
>"Never again" I vowed, with passion and anger in my heart.<p>

Farash lead the group, along with Applecore, Rugby and I. Rugby's zombies followed at the back of the pack with Moocman and Duffman, and it was the zombies who did all of the lifting. Each carried at least its own weight in materials and tools to help with this new settlement.  
>We travelled for the entire day, wandering as far as possible in one direction - being careful not to walk in circles.<p>

As the sun touched the mountains behind us, Farash built the resetter on a patch of land, and we decided to continue travelling through the night.

As I felt myself resetting, I saw a red glimmer in the distance that I was unfamilliar with. The glowing eyes of a new creature were sure to brighten up the night to come...

27th Night

I opened my eyes to the same scene I closed them to. This was, once again, a strange feeling. Either way, I had a new interest - the eight glowing red eyes.  
>I pointed it out to Farash, who nearly jumped with joy. He raced ahead, telling us to wait.<br>Applecore and I watched as he fired his bow once into the creature's back, then proceeded to mount it and begin to ride it. The creature seemed to bow to the Skeleton's will, and did not fight back. Farash rode back to us, and said only one word: "Spider..."  
>We were all very interested in the Spider. We had never seen one before, after all, and I remember thinking that Farash's ability to control them might come in useful one day.<p>

Around mid-night, as the moon reached the pinnacle of its arc in the sky, we found our new home. The entire convoy stopped dead when we saw it - there was no doubt it was perfect!

Sixty-nine Creepers, Eleven zombies and one Skeleton atop a Spider all stood and gazed upwards, for our new home was not of this world. A huge stretch of land, at least three times the size of Creeptopolis in whole, hung there in the sky, floating. None of us could explain it, but we all knew it would be both safe, and interesting.

Farash devised a plan to get up there quickly. He and the zombies quickly erected a stairway from the top of a nearby hill, giving us access to this strange floating island. The surface was just like any other piece of land, but digging too deep would be a danger. A Creeptopolis we would not have, but the freedom of living in open air would give many Creepers the release they needed after recent events.

We began our new civilization by setting the Resetter atop a shrine of sorts, made of stone.

I called a general meeting, and we Elders christened this island: Providence.

A flicker of Creeper community spirit had been reignited this night, and we once again looked to the future.

This was my last thought of the night:  
>"I wonder how long it will be, before we are truly happy again..."<p>

Somewhere at the back of my thoughts, I heard a response echo into the distance:

"...and until we can strike back...

35th Night

This has to be the first time since I met Charle that I have had time to sit down and write for my Diary. These last eight days have been manic, and a few important changes have taken place.  
>First, I met Charle. This human approached me holding some sort of blue gem but no weapons. His cautious yet friendly behaviour scared me at first, but when I saw that he was being escorted to Providence by one of my brothers I relaxed. I allowed him and the Creeper to explain themselves, and the explanation I received was very special indeed.<br>This Human was different. He was kind, and made the effort to talk to us. I appreciated that he had found me alone, as I am sure there are those in the community that would have gone straight for the kill.  
>He and the Creeper he was with explained to me about the four humans who attacked Creeptopolis. They were "The others...very misguided and masochistic people", said Charle. He said that after they banished him he found Creeptopolis, and the Creeper that stayed there all that time ago had met him, expecting to explode. This was where the blue gem came in - Charle called it a "Diamond". For some reason it had a kind of property that caused it to glow when near a Creeper, and halted the Creeper's ticking without any adverse effects. The Creeper had brought Charle to Providence because he realised the incredible importance this mineral held for us in our goals to be peaceful.<p>

Charle was hard to get into the community. I spoke to the Elders (who now included Farash and Rugby), and they each agreed the benefit of the Diamond was well worth the effort it would take to make the the other Creepers agree to have him stay.  
>Charle was willing to do what it took - he worked to build us a city, dug to find more diamonds and other minerals, and tried time and time again to get close to the other Creepers to chat. Although they had seem him with the Elders, people seemed nervous, which was understandable.<p>

After three or four days, I called a general meeting.

Applecore and I stood at the front of the pack on the podium, and the other Elders gathered behind us.  
>I looked out upon the sea of Creepers below me. My eyes wandered to the incredible overhang in the distance, and the cascading waterfalls masking the opening. The clouds kissed the tops of the mountains and great swathes of flowers grew on the hills. This truly was a beautiful place.<br>I stepped forward.

"Creepers hear me, one and all. A great treasure has befallen our people courtesy of Charle. This is the most valuable thing we have ever seen besides the Resetter, and I hope that this finally allows you all to accept him into our community. He has done so much for us already, let's not forget the methods we now have of controlling the ticking..."  
>Farash held up the small blue gem, and the crowd was awe-struck by the brilliant colour and amazing reflections it caused in the light.<br>"This small gem can be worn around the neck of any Human, and will cause any Creeper near that Human to be completely passive and end the danger of exploding. This is extremely valuable to us. It also seems that it stops skeletons and zombies from setting alight in the daytime. I am sure you will agree that this at least doubles its value to our community."

The crowd murmered, and a significant air of approval filled the area. Charle was now one of us, a part of Providence.

This was two days ago. Since then, the other two main changes to my life have occured.  
>Charle helped build more of Providence - adding a wall round the entire perimetre and a series of communal buildings that stood tall and silver in the sunshine. He truly did care for us as a species, and this earned him respect.<br>Finally, my old friend returned to me. Remember the first Creeper I ever met? The one that explained the sun to me and watched the sunrise with me? He spawned randomly inside our confines, and recognised me by name. The reunion was joyous, and he has now taken position as deputy-Elder underneath myself. As such, we had to name him. His name is Dragonchamp.

Yes, these last eight days have been eventful, and now we have a purpose - thanks to the incredible revelation that Creepers can live with Humans, and that Humans are somewhat trustworthy and ethical beings, all Creepers now have the goal to see all Humans and all Creepers living in harmony.  
>We will see this goal through.<p>

I promise myself.

Time for me to stop writing, I think. I have a lot to do tomorrow and I want to enjoy the sunrise with my good friend Dragonchamp.

Oh, and did I mention...that since Charle was accepted truly and my friend returned to me, my twisted face has changed to a pleasant smile? This was both unexpected, and amazing.

The way I see it, nothing can go wrong now.

36th Day

I reset as the sun hit its peak, and I was already very busy. Charle had come to me personally after waking up, planning to tell me of an idea he had. I did not want him to say until we were around the other Elders, so I told him to wait. He looked like he was desperate, so I let him give me a hint. All he had said was:  
>"Well, if you want to be peaceful..."<br>I stopped him there.

Right after I reset, I headed to the plaza where the other Elders were waiting in the central building, chatting amongst themselves. I had told Charle to meet us in a little while so that we had time to speculate and prepare for any suggestion he might make. We could not think of anything - sure, we wanted to be peaceful, but what could he possibly be suggesting that we hadn't been through already?

And so he came to us, and told us of his dream last night:

"I was sitting in this giant room, much like Creeptopolis before you built anything in it, I would assume. In front of me was a workbench, and I had created myself a white flag out of cloth and sticks."  
>I stopped him here. "You're suggesting we surrender ?"<br>"No no, just that to achieve peace, we have to show them we are peaceful."  
>"But how will we do that? We will be killed before we even reach their settlement - however big it is now..." Moocman interjected.<br>"Farash, you can teleport right?"  
>"Only...to known...locations..." was Farash's response.<br>"Well, then this is what I propose: a small group of us travel to the Human settlement, scope the place out and work out the best way to enter and leave them a note warning of a future visit. We will know if they accept because Farash can teleport in every now and then to check on the deliberations and tell us if it will be worth visiting or not!"

We all looked at each other while Charle stood there, triumphant smile on his face.

"Can we have a moment, Charle?" I asked.  
>He left promptly, slightly disheartened that his idea was not taken in right away.<p>

Duffman started the discussion: "Well, his idea is the best we have heard..."  
>"But it doesn't account for the danger Farash will be in, or the danger of being caught while travelling there..." Rugby now said.<br>"I...be...fine...Human avoid...invisible in the corner..." said Farash.  
>"So, that's one of the problems sorted - but here's a new one; what if they speak as if they want us to visit, and we do, and they have laid a trap?" I said breathlessly.<br>"We will just have to take that risk, I think" said Moocman.  
>We all looked at each other for at least a minute, in complete silence. I went over the risks and rewards in my head, and could not help thinking that if it does work; it will be the first major step towards the peace we want.<br>"OK, let's vote. Yes or no?"

"Yes" said Moocman.  
>"Yes" said Farash.<br>"No" said Rugby.  
>"Yes" said Duffman.<br>"No" said Applecore.  
>"So that's three yes's to two no's" I stated.<br>"It looks like it's your decision, Jonno" was Applecore's pleading response.

After another minute of silence, I could not help but say "Yes."

Three of the group nodded in respect, while two squirmed uncomfortably.

I shouted behind me "Charle, come back now."  
>He returned with a quizzical smile on his face.<p>

"We have decided to go with your plan. You, Farash, Rugby and I will travel now to get a scope of the location, and work out a way to deliver the message."  
>Charle jumped with joy.<br>"This is going to work, I know it! You won't be disappointed."

Wondering if my choice was the correct one, I moved outside and looked to the sky, noticing that sun was now nearly touching the mountains.

"We travel by night," I said aloud, "We will leave soon."

"Wait a moment!" Charle yelled from inside, quickly rushing out and past me, telling me to wait where I was.  
>He returned with a small black round device with a red line on it.<br>"This will point us back to the Resetter if we get lost. Now we are ready to go!"  
>"Impressive..." Farash said, able to step outside in the low light.<p>

"OK, so we head out when the moon begins to rise. Prepare wisely for a long journey..."

I headed to my home to tell Dragonchamp that I would be gone for a while.

I was only slightly optimistic about our journey, but as I headed back to the Plaza I thought:

" Hell, it's worth a shot , right? "

37th Night

And so we left.  
>We travelled in the direction from whence we had come for longer than it had taken to find Providence (for we had forgotten the exact path), and eventually ended up at the remains of Creeptopolis.<br>We went inside for a quick break, and the atmosphere of the place was eerie. It felt as though an ancient ruin - untouched and buried for many thousands of years. Complete and incredibly heavy silence greeted us, and none of us uttered a word to end it. A dank musty feel was in the air, and our hearts sank as we fully surveyed the damages done to our city.  
>The park was lost. Trees were left as stumps in the ground, blackened and lifeless. The River had overflowed and soaked the earth around it, ruining any chance for life's regrowth.<br>The main building at the back was in pieces. Huge holes had been ripped in the face, and one corner was missing entirely. Jagged edges littered the wrecked building, and the shattered windows showed signs that the Humans had searched the building.  
>As for the canals, they were dry - no water was left in the deep pits.<br>Houses were ransacked and ruined, and the skylight had been smashed out completely.

I looked to Farash as we moved slowly to the main building. The look he gave me echoed my own thoughts.  
>As we neared the building, a noise whispered from within. We froze in our places, afraid to move on. Had the Humans been waiting for our return? I looked to Charle, and nodded encouragingly. He called out in a broken voice.<br>"H-Hello? Is s-someone there?" (he had taught us enough of his peoples' language in the weeks before that we could now understand simple conversations).  
>"I am here, please enter" came the chilled, relaxed response. The voice was clear and soft, and I imagined that this would be how Farash would sound if he spoke fluently in our language.<br>We proceeded with Charle in front, Rugby, Farash and I following. While we were curious, we were ever cautious of traps, and moved slowly.

A scuffled scratching sound came from within the building, and we saw movement through one of the broken windows. Charle called to the stranger.  
>"Who are you?"<br>"Just come in, please" was the slightly rude answer.

When we finally reached the door, broken off and swinging noisily on the top hinge, a pasty white hand swung out and grabbed me. Cold with fear, I focussed heavily on not exploding. The ticking filled my mind and I became barely aware of my surroundings. My head grew burning hot and I was dizzy. And then...nothing. The darkness around me held strong and the ticking never ended. I was sure I was being dragged, but I couldn't be certain. Then the light returned, and I could hear Farash shouting at the person who had grabbed me. I wasn't focussed enough to understand the Human language, but I could tell it was not a friendly conversation.  
>As I regained focus and managed to stand, I was greeted by Rugby. He told me that Charle and Farash had taken the person inside to talk, and that he wanted only to be known as "The Resident." I was told he was ragged, as if he had been living off of scraps for weeks. I wanted to meet this man.<p>

I opened the door to see Charle backing away in what looked like blind fear. Farash stood between my only Human friend and another, more ragged Human, who I assumed to be The Resident. Despite Charle's reaction and Farash's apparently defensive stance, The Resident just stood there, perfectly collected.  
>I asked what was going on, and Charle ran to me, cowering behind me, whispering something about danger and traps. Farash turned to me and said one word in Human; a word that I recognised:<p>

"Leader..."

As the sun hit the top of the glorious daytime sky, the only sounds in Creeptopolis were the cowering whimpers of Charle as he spoke of the Human's satanic leader.

37th Day

The world faded in, and it was exactly the same! I was expecting to be scattered without the prescence of the resetter, and had been focussed on finding Creeptopolis again. But here I was, in the main building - we all were; in the same awkward positions. I went to ask what happened, but I was interrupted by a quick hand gesture from "Leader", pointing my view over to a Resetter identical to the one at Providence. Farash was astounded - he had told us a certain magic was required to actually successfully place one.  
>"How...Resetter...move...?"<br>Leader threw his arms up above his head and laughed. Objects began to float, spinning around him. With a self-complacent smile he glanced at the objects around him. He spoke now in Creeper: "I taught myself the ways of the Skeletons...the power of their ways is mine!"  
>Even Charle relaxed - if a man with the power of the Skeletons wanted to hurt us he would not need to invite us inside to do it. Charle spoke in a broken voice. "H-How did you do it? Why are you here?"<br>Suddenly a look of sombre nostalgia passed over Leader's actions. He told us his story:  
>"Just after the four of us banished you and changed your spawn point, things started getting a little boring for the Humans. Two of us wanted to settle, and the other two wanted to move on constantly. With time our party grew discomforted, constantly arguing about what to do. Then we found Crakolisia-"<br>"Crakolisia?" Rugby interjected. Leader cleared his throat and continued.  
>"If you'll let me finish...Crakolisia was a small town of around ten Humans. The two of us who wanted to settle found homes there, and the community began to thrive. Within a few days we had grown in number to exactly twenty-one Humans, all working together to build a fortress in which we could live."<br>"Then came the Elected. These were five people who wanted ultimate control, and muscled in a supposed democracy. They were elected by their own doing, and immediately began to change things in Crakolisia. I grew unhappy with the changes, and spoke out against the Elected. I wanted to see Crakolisia take a more peaceful route than the one they were suggesting - I wanted to explore again, to reach out into this world and maybe even give back what we had taken. Remember, I am only Leader by name, and they saw my "sudden change of heart" as a weakness. After two days of trying to amass a sizeable protest, I was banished from the newly-named City, now known as Eltos."  
>Charle stood and pointed his finger at Leader. "So you're telling me that after nearly killing me, you went and had a change of heart! How dare you!"<br>Leader bowed his head and spoke quietly. "Of course there are no excuses for my actions in regards to you, but I promise I have changed for the better."  
>"So why all the ragged clothes, and where did you learn the Skeletons' secrets?" I asked.<br>"When I was kicked out, I went exploring for a while. I dug through caves with my bare hands, I searched and searched for safe respite during the night. I died many times during this process, and then I found this place. I immediately recognised this as the place the raid team were describing, and realised what we Humans had done. We had driven you from this place, ruined your home. You had never shown any signs of being aggressive as a unit, yet we eliminated you just in case. Out of respect for your people, I vowed to stay and rebuild what I could."  
>I nodded in respect, and he continued.<br>"At first it was difficult - without the proper tools I could not really do anything to help myself, so I began to steal from Eltos. I was nearly caught one time, and I had to run fast, completely missing the hill beneath my feet. This is why my clothes are so ragged. As it turns out, the fall was worth it - it damn near killed me, but when I woke from my daze I saw a long cave stretching ahead of me, lit by torches. As I explored this deep underground cavern, I found many books in a strange dialect talking of the "power" and "knowledge" of the universe. Through this and the many rooms branching off the large halls, I learned the secrets of the Skeletons. I was suddenly able to command objects of the world to bow to my will, move impossibly fast to any known location, and even read the minds of creatures and people near to me."  
>"My...Home!" whispered Farash. I thought to myself - Could he really have stumbled upon the very place I had met Farash? Before I could ask, Leader continued.<br>"I was laying in this building one night, and I heard a whisper on the wind, as if someone was sending me a telepathic message. I focussed in on it, and what I found were not words, but images. I saw the building and destruction of Creeptopolis through your eyes" - he pointed at me as he said this - "and I cried myself to sleep. I had never felt such happiness, such pride...and never so betrayed and hurt. At last I truly understood what had happened here, and vowed that I would wait for you to return, to aid in your ever-pressent goal of a peaceful existence."

I just stood there, stunned. I had wept before, but I could not. This man, this incredible man, had waited for us. He wanted to help - and he had power like no other man. He looked deep into my eyes - no, my soul - and the glint in his eye told me he was sincere. I looked around the room for the first time, and noticed that everything had been refurbished.  
>Suddenly I felt myself resetting - we had been here in this room all day, listening to Leader speak.<br>Before the quick period of blackness, I had time to think to myself:  
>"And soon we shall finally have peace."<br>I held my gaze with Leader as the reset kicked in, for I could not bring myself to break it.

38th Night

The moon was high in the sky as we broke free of our old dwelling place, and Leader took point and led the way. "It will be a relatively long journey...maybe most of the night. I can't teleport all of us at once..." Leader said shakily.  
>Little conversation took place on the way - we were all too nervous. Leader, who was returning to a place he was ultimately unwelcome in, was especially so - it could be seen in his awkward slow movements and broken voice.<br>We passed a few familiar locations on the way - A huge U-shaped valley that stretched to the sky's limit, a massive enclosed tunnel lit by periodic natural skylights and an awe-inspiring waterfall of blue, cascading down the side of a very sizeable mountain of deep grey rock. I regarded as I always do while travelling that this world is beautiful, and I became nostalgic; thinking back to the events that led the Creepers to be afraid of it.

It felt as I looked back that the events were actually happening again; but they were different - I saw new sides of things I could not percieve at the time.

I approached the Human, curious as to what it was and wishing to communicate. I realise now that it would not have understood me if I managed to get in range to speak properly, but at the time I pressed on. It fired an arrow at me, and I felt the pain in my chest as before. This time, I looked at the Human as I would a Creeper - it was just defending itself. I fell to the ground, confusion and distress in my mind, and watched it laugh. Was it laughing because it was happy with its kill, or because it had survived my monstrous explosion?

This memory in particular was important to me - I remember seeing the first Creeper I had ever seen at the top of the mountain, and I was filled with joy as I died.  
>Looking back now, I could see so many new facets to the Human's behaviour that I simply could not have known back then. At the time I looked at the Human with confusion and hatred, but now I look in respect - these people had powers that I could not hope to rival, and according to Leader's tales, capacity for great change.<br>"Maybe I'll even see this Human again" I quietly muttered to myself.

I sat in a small bunker, watching the sunrise with the first Creeper I had met. We now call him Dragonchamp, but we did not need names at the time. I remember the awe in my mind as the light flooded the great planes beneath me, and I remember that it was then that I formulated my plan. This first day was the basis and creation of Creeperville, and led to the actions we were about to take now...

My memory skipped to the first time I welcomed everyone to my community.

I looked over the crowd beneath me, and around the city we had built. The zombies stood in the far corner, away from the group, and only three Creepers stood with me. I spoke to the crowd in words that came silently in this memory, and they reacted as I remembered - cheers filled the canyon as light began to strike down from the skylight. I was extremely proud of Creeptopolis, and I saw its future as nothing but bright and peaceful.

How wrong I was.

The Humans burst through the smoke and faced me. Destruction was all around me and I saw them try to kidnap me. I said good bye to my fell

ow Creepers, but Farash saved me. If it were not for Farash, I would not have been making this journey, and who knows what would have happened to my Community. I remembered the great curtain of depression that descend and affected us long into the morning, leading to our decision to move. We travelled far, and found Providence. It was here that we made the mark we always wanted, and it was from here that we would finally change this world forever. We would not run from the world, living in the sky, any longer...

The vivid images of first destruction and then discovery filled my mind. I was reminded of the time at which Charle first came to us, and a great feeling of gratitude grew inside of me. I looked to my Human friend walking beside me, and I could only think in respectful terms for this man.

My fit of nostalgia was interupted by the break of dawn on the world we were travelling, and an incredible new sight greeted our group on the horizon. Eltos stretched above and ahead of us, the gates large and ominous.

"We will enter when day has struck" said Leader, a renewed confidence in his voice.  
>"Be...Prepared...we must..." added Farash.<br>"Are you sure we'll be ok?" asked Charle nervously.  
>Rugby turned and spoke casually - "hell, how bad can it be?"<br>I looked around at the group, nothing but love and respect in my heart for the representatives of world peace.  
>"It's settled. We enter when the sun hits the top of the sky. Here's hoping we'll be welcomed."<br>My main thought in the deep silence that followed was one that raised a dark feeling in my body:  
>"This is nothing like the original plan..."<p>

38th Day

The sun hit the top of the sky with about the same impact as my heart hitting the floor.  
>The gates began to open by themselves!<br>We did not know what to do. Farash held Rugby in place, and advised that we stay. Leader turned to me and the expression on his face spoke nothing but fear. He seemed unable to move, so it looked like we were staying.  
>The great creak of the wooden gates echoed far into the distance, and the deep bellow of the impact when they had fully opened replicated the harsh beating of our pulses.<br>A single Human appeared at the centre of the gates, way into the distance. He walked in our direction, and stopped at the great opening. We moved closer, only to be stopped by arrows, carefully aimed to land in front of us...or had they missed their targets? The Human shouted from the gates. "Hail. I am Gorok, Leader of Eltos. Please follow. You will not be harmed, providing you do not try anything funny."  
>"How do we know you're telling the truth?" yelled Leader.<br>"You have my word...and my life, should you be harmed." Was the reply.

And so we followed.  
>Gorok lead us through a great passage, trailed on either side by buildings of stone. Many Humans crowded the edge of the passage, murmuring, chatting and showing signs of disapproval. Gorok paid no attention to his people, and did not speak until we were inside a large white building at the back of the city.<br>"Wait inside. I will collect the council."  
>"Wait, do you know why we are here?" I asked, surprised.<br>"We have a spy in your city of Providence. We have always had a spy in your ranks." Was the astonishing reply.  
>Gorok moved quickly away, as if cautious of an attack after this revelation, and we were left reeling from his statement.<br>We broke into chaotic chatter, all of us wondering who it could have been. I had my own suspicions, but it did not matter either way - I saw this as a good thing. It meant, overall, that we would have less explaining to do, and if they were truly hostile they could have attacked long ago. This news was a good sign.

A little while later, after standing inside the white building for a small time, we heard Gorok's voice again. He came through a small door in one corner, followed by three other people, who he introduced as Mattinew, Lakto and Signa.  
>"This is our council - similar to your original council of Elders in Creeptopolis, I believe."<br>His knowledge of our lives somewhat frightened me, but I kept my calm. Rugby was becoming more and more uncomfortable in his actions, and Leader was too afraid to talk. Farash was, as ever, calm and collected, but kept throwing me cautionary glances.

We were led into a small with a divider of sorts. The Humans laid pieces of paper on the divider and asked us to read.  
>It was a dream come true. More - it was not possible.<br>The documents read:  
>It has come to the people of Eltos's attention that the Creeper community (inclusive of all creatures not Human and one exiled Human) desires peace between our cities. We recognise the importance of such peace, and wish to build relations also. This will come at a price, however - we would require that the city of Providence be passed onto complete ownership by the Eltos Empire, and that the people of Providence live either under our rule, or elsewhere. We would also require trade to begin between our people in the form of gunpowder, as this is a valuable material to us.<br>If you agree to the terms, sign below.

This was amazing news at first sight. My heart beat erratically and my head grew dizzy. I re-focussed and read again, taking in all the information this time.  
>"May we have time to discuss?" I asked Gorok.<br>"We will leave for as long as you need. We ask that you do not damage the property, and in return you will have free choice and as much time as required. Please press the button on the wall when you are ready for our return."  
>With that, the council left.<p>

We all looked at each other, none saying a word. This went on for some time.  
>There was some sort of device on the wall that displayed the position of the sun, and it currently showed that the day was nearly done. It seemed we would be here for longer than expected.<p>

The discussion extended to the end of the day, and I realised that we would probably not reach a decision on this day.

Sure enough, the sun fell and the device showed the moon's rising.  
>I felt myself reset in the same place (I remember worrying about not resetting in the same place - there must have been a resetter somewhere nearby), and I dived headlong back into the discussion.<p>

39th Night

We had reached a decision by mid-night. The first half was spent making heated discussion, all five of us had opinions and ideas about the pros and cons of signing the documents. It was difficult, but we all eventually agreed.  
>This is the way I saw it, and the way everyone else came to see it:<p>

Pros:  
>* Security wherever we lived under the influence of Eltos<br>* Proper trade, so as to gain materials to build quicker  
>* Possibly an influx of new population as the people of Eltos realise the importance of a new ally<br>* The dream we had all hoped for  
>Cons:<br>* We would have to give up Providence, or live there under Eltosian rule  
>* We would be subject to somehow providing gunpowder (according to Charle, this is the material inside a Creeper that gives us our explosive properties)<br>* We would be oblidged to help our new allies, maybe with things we do not want to do  
>* The contract was incomplete, and felt rather unproffessional. The terms were short, and all in the Eltosian's favour. This could mean a potential risk of future betrayal by an ally who is, in all truth, too powerful for us to effectively counter<br>As a group, we had carefully whittled down the cons to a mere few - mainly by agreeing to come at the Eltosians with a hard set attitude to compromise, but not complete submission. Leader and Charle were uplifted by this decision, and encouraged Farash, who was cautious as ever of the Human race, to agree too. Rugby was casual, as if he did not care (which confused me at the time).

We eventually decided to press the button, and we allowed Leader to do the honours.

Within seconds the door sprang open and the Council walked in, lead by a seemingly confident Gorok. Silence fell as the Council took its place on the other side of the divider, and we took ours in front of them.

"Let delegations begin" spoke Signa, a powerful ring to his voice.  
>"Yes, have you decided to agree to our terms?" asked Lakto.<p>

Charle and Leader looked uncomfortable yet again, and Farash could not communicate our point very well, so I decided to take the lead seeing as Rugby didn't make an attempt.

"We have discussed the terms of the contract, and would like to come to a compromise of sorts. We see the importance of an alliance and it is our dream to achieve peace. Please hear our response."

The council members turned to each other and nodded, small murmers passing between them. Eventually, Gorok turned to me and nodded once. I took it as a sign that I should continue.

"Our community is vast, and very proud. We would like to keep our home. In return, we would be more than willing to accept Human visitors, and even add an Eltosian to our order of Elders. We will also submit to whatever method required, providing it is non-violent, to retrieve our gunpowder."

Once again the council members deliberated. Farash placed a hand on my shoulder and shot me an approving look. It seems I had communicated our desires in the best way possible.

Gorok turned to me after some time, and asked for a minute or two. He took the documents from in front of us, and walked out of the room, the door creaking shut behind him. We all stood in awkward silence while he was gone, and were relieved when he returned. He bore some fresh pieces of paper, and placed them in front of us.  
>"I believe you will be pleased with the adjustments" he hissed, somewhat bitter.<br>I read the new document and could have wept again. It was everything we had asked for, and it detailed the way in which gunpowder would be received. I was relieved to see that it was a simple case of self-concentration, and completely harmless. The amount they wanted per day was relatively extortionate, but by no means impossible. Overall, the new document was the Providincial dream come true.

Our group of five turned inwards, and we didn't say a word. We could all see that this was a deal we simply couldn't pass up, and so we turned and allowed Charle and Leader to sign them.

After much administration, we were provided with a small Eltosian party to return to Providence with us, and were led to the gates. The mood was light, and I met many Humans. None seemed as bad as the ones Leader had described, but some were certainly undesirable. Either way - they were our new kindred. Impossible as it may sound after so long spent dreaming, peace had finally visited our world, and the newly named Protesian Empire was sure to prosper.

Thanks to Charle's compass, we got home quickly, just before the sun rose again. We called a general meeting, and the full community gathered, eager to hear news.

I stood alone on the podium, and announced our new alliance to all Providence. We later heard reports that the cheering could be heard in Eltos itself. This was everything we had hoped for - the dream of Providence come to life. Nothing could have prepared us all for this incredible development, and everyone knew that all the effort spent to achieve this outcome was worth it.

I stepped down from the podium as the sun rose into the sky. The Order (our new name for our group of Elders) met in the main building to begin building a new leadership system, and life continued.

Epilogue

I sit here now with my Eltosian friend Drek, writing this last entry. He found my Diary in a chest in my home, and urged me to recite it to him. When I did so, he wrote it all out into a tightly-bound leather book, thick and robust. I am speaking to you now, after one hundred days. My memory is still fresh of the events of that day, and I can tell you that life just kept improving every day.  
>The Protesian Empire sprouted forth into the world, expanding continuously and finding prosper wherever it reached. The alliance had worked, and peace truly was realised. New creatures have been discovered and the Empire has grown. Research into new areas of Crafting has taken place, and schools teaching the Powers of the Skeletons have been erected. Explorers map the world in painstaking detail, and from their inscriptions the entire Empire is eager to discover the literally endless world we live in. New methods have been discovered to allow all creatures to live for longer, and in a quite literal sense, everything is perfect.<br>I soon will travel back to the ruins of Creeptopolis, the birthplace of the Creeper's Dream, and place this Diary in a chest that someone might one day find it. Chances are the Protesian Empire will move on over time, so hopefully this will be an incredible legend to a lonely wandering reader, and a beacon of hope in the great loneliness this world can place upon us.

~~~~~  
>THE END<p>

If you are reading this then I am glad to have found an audience. Please take lessons from my Diary, and remember - your dreams are always just beyond the horizon. If you strive to achieve them and deal with every bump on the way, they are attainable.  
>Just remember, dear Reader, remember the example the Protesian Empire has set, and remember that we are real, and we are still out there somewhere.<p>

I truly hope you have enjoyed my Diary.

Yours,  
>Jonno<p>

~~~~~ 


	5. The Heart Of The Nether

The Heart of the Nether

George was sat at his desk at work, thinking about how bored he was. He started filling out a form for some government thing. His office job was perhaps the most boring job.

At the end of the day, he was first out of the office block, a gleeful smile playing on his lips. He went round to the car park and went over to his car. Before he unlocked it, however, he realised that it was not there. He glanced around the car park: he couldn't see the pink Cadillac. He reached into his pocket for his phone, to call the police, only to realise that his mobile had been stolen too. He checked for any nearby phone boxes, but there weren't any. He decided to walk to a police station.

About fifteen minutes later, he arrived at the police station. As he stepped into the threshold, he began to feel dizzy. George collapsed onto the floor.

When he got up, it was dark outside. He was somehow in his home. He went to the front door, but it was locked. The same went for the back door. He was trapped in his own house.

He went upstairs to his bed. He found himself in the kitchen. He tried to go upstairs again, but to no avail. He noticed that there was a laptop on the table. There hadn't been one before. He turned it on. The computer asked George for a password, quite politely. George entered a string of numbers that had just come into his head. The screen changed to a Word document: titled "Small".

"Hello George. I have been watching you for weeks now I think now it is time for me to intradice myself o am the hand and I contrl u but not easily I have trapped u in ur howse with no food or nuffin hahaha "

George could make no sense of the document. He clicked Delete. Instead of the actual document being deleted, only the text was deleted. However, more text appeared.

"ow that hurt u know"

George was surprised at this apparently coherent mind of a computer. He typed " are you alive"

"yes in a sense" was the response.

George took a step back, and fell off a small ledge into grass. His house was nowhere to be seen. After having a look around, he concluded that he was in a field. He started walking in a random direction.

After, according to his watch, six hours, he had not made much headway. He had only come a few metres. But as he looked back, the place where he started got further and further away. The grass that he was stood on started to change into hard stone. Trees sprouted from the ground around him, and leaves formed a canopy above his head.

Then everything changed again.

The trunks of the trees became a perfect square. The leaves became cubes, each one identical to all the others. George felt himself getting slightly shorter, his arms and legs became wider, shorter, and cubed. The sun started moving much faster. In an instant, he realised what had happened.

He had gone to hell.

He was wrong.

Although at first, the strange, cube place seemed very much like hell. Outside of the the tree canopy, lava flowed freely like streams or rivers, and there were seas of magma. Wherever George looked, he saw a strange red stone - also cubed. George named this blood red stone "Mark."

So George started to wander throughout the strange realm, and encountered an ugly zombie thing. It held a golden sword. The creature turned its repulsive, cubic face towards him, and made an odd sound: a combination of a grunt and a moan. George was also astonished that there were more of these pig-like things. As he started to walk away, he couldn't help but notice a crowd of them following him, which grew steadily larger as more and more pig things came out if hidden alcoves and caves.

What seemed like a few minutes later, they had come a surprisingly long way. They had passed a few giant white cubes by now, which shot fireballs at them, but nothing more. Eventually, George and his enormous crowd of pig things reached a black archway - the first non-red thing George had seen other than lava, pig things and giant floating white cubes. It seemed to be nothing other than an arch. George tried punching it, as he had discovered earlier that this caused cracks to appear in Mark. This, however, had no effect, other than causing pain.

Suddenly, George felt a pig-like hand grab his shoulder and pull down hard, causing him to bow. A fireball flew over his head and smashed into the arch, which instantly set on fire. George watched, amazed, as the fire became purple and spread to the four corners of the arch.

He realised it was a portal.

Without even thinking, George stepped into the portal, and felt its immense power flow over him. He closed his eyes and enjoyed the sensation. He felt the air around him become more moist: he hadn't realised it was bone-dry before. He felt wind on his skin. He heard leaves rustling. He felt something soft-ish press into his leg. Opening his eyes, he saw himself surrounded by cows. He also noticed that the grass was pink. This however was not the most striking thing. The cows were red. It took George a moment to realise that they had mushrooms growing out of their backs, too. George tried to take a mushroom off the cow, but with his new cubic arms he only ended up punching it. The strange cow emitted a stranger sound that filled George with guilt, and ran away. George took a look around. It seemed he was on an island, with purple and pink grass everywhere, and enormous mushrooms growing out of the ground. These mushrooms were up to about ten metres high. He then felt a burst of heat; he turned around and saw that a few of the zombie pig things had been set on fire. George heroically started to punch the fire out.

Suddenly, George was attacked by the rest of the pig things. They slashed their golden swords at him and threw them at him. Most of them were burning by now. He started to run away, and as he did so they started to lose interest in him, just milling about and waiting to burn. A few of the more intelligent ones went back through the portal. George carried on running, oblivious to this change in emotion behind him. Suddenly, the grass changed texture beneath his feet. He looked down and saw that it was green. He continued walking, looking at the grass, when he walked into a signpost. The sign read:

NOW ENTERING SPAWNPOINT

George wondered what this meant. He walked towards the city that he could see in the distance.

Meanwhile, many kilometres away, a machine was watching him through a system of security cameras arranged around the spawnpoint. The machine had known something was odd with this player. For a start, he had spawned in the nether. He also had no username above his head, and had not typed in the chat log yet. He also walked a bit differently to all the other players. The machine started up an error message that it had not yet used.

In London, England, a computer had a program running on it: Minecraft Server. There was an error message: WARNING:UNKNOWN ENTITY.

Back at the spawnpoint, George had met a lot of people. They just looked at him. There was no sound other than that which feet make when they go on cobblestone. No one spoke. Some people didn't even look like people at all. Some looked like various superheroes. Some looked like characters from films. At least two were walking scribbles. One had a burger instead of a head. And they all had names floating above their head: banjofred, Clean0nion, Xephos, Alpharita, OhLolz, redflameman0, Dreamare, Notch, Vinegar_Cupcake. The list was endless. Someone walked up to him. He looked like someone from a popular series of games, though George couldn't quite put his finger on it. He didn't even have fingers here. The person looked at him for a long time.

This is what other players saw in the chat log:

Admin LordSniffle: Hello?

Cheesy joined the game.

Admin LordSniffle: hello?

Admin LordSniffle: why aren't you responding

Admin LordSniffle: why is there not a name above your head

Builder Clean0nion: probably a hacker

Admin LordSniffle: yeah probably

Admin LordSniffle: if you don't respond I'll ban you

Guest Cheesy: how can i be builder

X was banned by LordSniffle!

Admin LordSniffle: x?

George was floating through nothing, in a world of emptiness...

Then he was on solid ground. He was in a forest, and he could see no people. He tried punching a tree, since he had no tools and he felt he should make some sort of shelter. His fist touched the tree, and a strong voice boomed in his head:

YOU DON'T HAVE PERMISSION FOR THIS AREA.

George couldn't touch the tree without getting a headache. Night was falling very fast. He started to run away, perhaps find a house that he could borrow.

He found a fence.

No matter how hard he tried, George couldn't get over the fence. Although it looked like he could jump over it easily, it was obviously taller than it looked. He started walking round the inside of the fence. After a while he was back where he started. He started to sit on the ground when he heard footsteps from behind. He turned around to see a man in a blue shirt. George smiled, hoping he had found a friend, when it let out a moan, quite similar to the moans that the pig things had made. In that instant, he knew it was a zombie. Before he had started to think about the best escape route, a skeleton archer riding on a giant spider shot him in the arm. George screamed as two zombies tore of his shirt and dug their fingers into his belly, ripping his skin apart and biting into his intestines, as blood flowed all over the grass and bits of gut littered the ground.

George started floating in nothing again, feeling terrified after that experience. He quickly respawned. An old man was sat on a cube of wool in front of him.

"Hello," he said. This, being the first speech George had heard in a long time, disorientated him and rendered him unable to reply. Instead he just gasped.

"Hello," repeated the man. "I hope you have had an inspiring adventure. I will send you home now. You will then have a week to prepare for your next journey into the heart of the Nether. Goodbye,"

George did not understand any of this in his disorientated state. When he got home, he slept for a whole day.

On Tuesday, he drove to work in an old rusty car he had found in his garage. At least, that is what he planned to do.

He couldn't open the front door. Nor the back. Checking the computer, he found a document titled "Large".

"No," muttered George. "Not again!"

On the 4th of October, 2013, millions of Java files vanished. Thousands of Minecraft servers crashed, their core data wiped out. Only one server remained, and eventually all players migrated there.

Everyone was there, even George.

George led a silent life. He could not speak nor hear the voices of those around him, and he never heard the wind or the trees rustling. He only ever heard traumatic moans, terrifying hisses and and the twangs of bows. He didn't mind. He hardly ever spoke in his old life. He had once read a document called "Large" and it had told him his mission. But that was a long time ago, and it was forgotten. So, on the fourth day of the tenth month, he was petrified when the ringing started. He couldn't know that it was thousands of players all joining the server at the same time. The waves of intolerable sound crashed around his poor ears, and he was lost and confused. But he instinctively knew that he had to get away. Fleeing to the portal on the island where the giant mushrooms were, he climbed inside, and felt the heat of hell wash over him. The ringing instantly stopped. It was strange that he was completely cut off from the world here. He liked it.

He strolled back to where he had started his adventure, a small platform of stone under a canopy of leaves. Sitting down on the hot stone, he took the time to remember what life had been like before. He couldn't. Even simple things like his cars registration plate failed to rise out of the depths of his memory. He ended up thinking about buying a new minecart.

George punched down a tree and replanted it to ease the monotony of a life alone. It didn't help, so he did it again. Now he had a lot of saplings, and not enough dirt. He quickly made a chest and dumped all his stuff in there. Then he explored.

Away from George, a hole appeared in the ground, and someone climbed out. The new person had a look around, and quickly spotted Georges canopy. The person destroyed it and threw the remnants into the magma. She then heard a ghast and quickly went back down her hole, covering it up as she went down. She forgot to destroy some leaves.

George decided to come back from exploring. Trying to find his canopy, he unwittingly walked past the place where it had been. He was sure it was round here somewhere. He knew he hadn't gone this far away from the house… had he been going in a huge circle?

Utterly lost, George saw an expansive iron dome in the distance. For some stupid reason, he thought it could be his canopy. He ran as fast as he could towards it. His feet kept hitting nice solid blood-red ground, and then it didn't. He had run into a pit of magma.

He spent his final moments trying to scream in pure agony as the magma tore at his skin, trying to melt into his body.

Then he woke up.

George mumbled "Ahh. It was just a dream,"

Then he realised that it wasn't.

"Are you okay?" asked a calm voice coming from a blurry outline of something.

"Huh?" George had not heard another human for a long time. He had almost forgotten how to speak. Lights shone in his eyes, so he squinted. The blur condensed into a person, though still with a cube head and oblong-like body.

"How are you feeling?" asked the person, patiently.

"Yeah, I'm fine," George found himself replying. He was dizzy. The person began asking other questions that were completely irrelevant to what he was thinking, so he ignored them. His death had made him remember something about his heart and the Nether or something like that. He was unaware that someone had entered the room until he felt an enormous jolt of pain in his torso. "Aarrgh!" he screamed. He saw the silhouette of a person, undistinguishable because of the shape. The stranger had a bow in his hand and was putting another arrow into it. The person who had shone lights in his eyes seemed to be wrestling the bow away from him. The bow broke and splinters of wood fell to the floor. Both people stared at the remains for a second before the guy who had the bow pulled out a strange iron object which looked a bit like a bent ingot. Pointing it at George, he pulled a trigger and pain exploded everywhere.

The world went silent.

After what seemed like forever, sudden cracks of light shredded through the walls. Uncomfortable changes took place in Georges body. After a while, the sound of cars could be heard, along with an alarm ringing loudly. George hit the alarm clock and it stopped.

George had breakfast, got dressed and got into his car. Only then did he realise that he had gone home. He wondered if this was a dream, but decided that you didn't think about these things in a dream. He arrived at work. After work, he bought a burrito and ate it whilst watching the news. He went to bed. As he lay there, he thought about his day. He remembered waking up and turning off the alarm clock… but there was no memory between that and getting into his car. There was no memory between that and the burrito, either.

George woke up. It had been a dream after all, and the first time he had dreamt between deaths. He was stood in a 9x9 hole in the ground, one block deep. A couple of leaves still remained in the air. He had been griefed, but he just wanted to find the heart of the Nether. It seemed that every death brought a little more memory back. He had no idea where it was, so he needed help. There was no one in the Nether that could help him, so George set off towards he portal that he had found on his first day, but this time no zombie pigmen followed him. When he stepped into the portal, he knew he had made a mistake. The intolerable ringing was back, but not as powerful as it was last time. That meant that the guy had assassinated him in the Nether, since there was no sound there. George squelched around in the mycelium for a bit, and rode a cow. Eventually, he got down to business and set off for destination Spawn City.

By the time he arrived there was hardly any ringing, but if he concentrated it was still there. There was a lot of noise. Someone was selling cyan dye for, apparently, the cheapest price ever. A guy with a cape was boasting about his MineCon application. Two knights were chucking an assortment of stuff on the floor. Someone with elbows and a huge nose walked absently off a small cliff. George found that people were speaking, and he could speak to them! He gave a cry of delight, and a fellow with a salad bowl instead of a head turned to look at him. George plotted, and put a plan into action. He jumped up onto a stage. "OI!" he shouted. Most of the noise stopped. "Does anyone know anything about the heart of the Nether?"

"Yes!" shouted someone.

"What do you know?"

"Legend tells of a hero who will slay the dragon and become the heart of the Nether!"

A few more people contributed, but most were things like "It pumps blood around the place". So George continued on his way. Someone followed him and when they were out of earshot of the town, he whispered "Trust no one. Don't go to the End. They'll let you win. Don't go to the End unless you want to stay here for the rest of your life!"

George couldn't hear him. The wind whipped the words away.

After a long time of traveling, he was very hungry. He didn't know that that was possible here. He kept slogging on, and the monotony bored him, and it was dull, and he felt like it - CRACK! He had stepped on a trap! Before he could react, he was falling…

George landed in a good two metres deep pit of water. He seemed to be in some sort of library, and the room smelt of old books. There was a hole in the wall, so he peered through. A tall, thin man stood there, made of darkness. Terror exploded in George. The man had seen him! Suddenly, another block disappeared in the wall. The man was about nine feet tall with wide purple eyes, and a block of the wall in his hands. His mouth hung open as he stared hungrily at George. George was terrified. With a scream he turned and ran away, down a corridor, past torches on the wall, through a room with a fountain. He collapsed to the floor, panting.

But then the thing teleported to him.

George struck out with his fist in horror, and the things jaw clattered to the ground. It comically rotated ninety degrees and disappeared in a puff of smoke. George stared at the jaw. After a while, he heard clicking noises nearby. When he heard the twang of a bow, he remembered the creatures that had caused his first death. He started walking in the other direction, barely keeping his fear in check. After a while, he arrived in a room with a small fountain and a ladder. Because he was curious, he climbed the ladder. Upstairs, he found a chest which contained apples and a few ingots. George destroyed his hunger. He had a quick look around and saw some of the tall people in another room to the side. Did they live here? One of them turned around. George looked away, but kept them in the corner of his eye. They didn't seem to mind his presence. He decided to take a closer look at them.

As soon as he had focused on one, it attacked him. It lashed out with its long thin arms, clawing at Georges face, and its jaw hung open. But this time George knew what to do. He punched the jaw and it fell away from the thing. It died in the same way as the other, but a small navy crystal sat in its place. George picked it up. It was shiny. He slipped it in his pocket. Walking out of the room, he took a torch from the wall and put it in the room he had just come out of. Now he saw a chest. It contained nothing, except a strange orange rod. It was very hot. "Ow!" cried George as he picked it up. His hand released it, and as it hit the floor it smashed into powder. The remaining tall thing still ignored him. He took the pearl and the powder and rubbed them together. The pearl transformed! It was now lighter and more sinister-looking. George accidentally dropped it, and it floated about five feet towards a corridor before falling to the floor. He picked it up, and went through that corridor. He stopped suddenly. He had heard a voice.

"No! I just need one more!"

George crept forwards a little.

"If only I had another Ender Pearl… then I would have enough Eyes to go to the End!"

What? thought George. He looked into the room. There was a ring of blue glowing stone, and only one block in the ring wasn't glowing. There was a pit of magma beneath it. There was also a flaming cage on some stairs. Getting closer, he heard the quiet cursing of the other person, and saw that the glowing blocks had crystals in them like his own, except one. The person shouted "I'll go to Spawn City" and jumped into the magma. He saw George just before he died.

George was alone again. He saw a hole in the ceiling where the person had come down. The sun was directly over the hole. Torches were stuck all over the cage. George placed the final Eye of Ender in the block, and darkness spread inside the ring.

"Another portal…" muttered George. Without thinking, he jumped in.

For a moment, Georges world was nothing but pure darkness. Then his feet touched solid ground - perhaps too solid, and his mind whirled as awareness of the stamina of something blossomed in his mind. The platform he was now stood on was made of the same black stone as the portal on his first day. Around twenty metres away was the mainland, but George had no idea how to get there. The mainland appeared to be white with a slight yellow tint. George took as large a run-up as he could and threw himself off the edge, towards the mainland. He smashed onto a small ledge near the bottom and he felt like his legs were broken. George started shuddering uncontrollably. Tears crawled out of his eyes. He had not felt so much pain, even when he was being ripped apart. This dimension was causing this enhancement of pain. George almost wanted to plummet off the edge but his muscles did not obey. He saw movement in the corner of his eye. Someone had appeared on the platform, and was looking down at him.

"Help…" he managed to squeeze out of his lips.

The person saw someone stranded down at the bottom of the End. He typed "/res local" to view the statistics of those around him. He saw "TESTIFICATE: Health 0.5 Town &e0 Clan &e0 Friends no friends"

He had been told that this would happen. He typed "/gamemode TESTIFICATE 1"

George felt the pain in his body diminish. He knew he was dying, and therefore hallucinating. The person faded. George prepared himself for his first silent death. It didn't come. After a while, the realisation struck him. He was immortal! He jumped up, and flew up into the air. Confidence and adrenaline surged through his body - until he saw what was happening on the mainland.

Millions of the tall black things stalked the land. Colossal towers of the black stone stabbed out of the ground. But what was most terrifying was the huge dragon swooping not only through things like a knife through a victim, but towards him. The colour of the dragon didn't help the image either - it was the colour of death. The dragon swooped down, apparently to attack George, but he felt no pain. A gleeful smile played on his lips. He punched it, and felt its stamina reduce by a tiny amount. This could take a while, he thought. Then the dragon turned round back towards the towers, and a white cube on one of them fired a beam at the dragon. Georges smile grew larger until he felt the stamina increase, and his smile dropped. He had to destroy those cubes. He flew up to one of them and punched it. George was thrown backwards as it exploded. Excellent, he thought, now I can kill the dragon. Then he saw another cube on another tower. And another. And another. And another. There were hundreds. George knew he couldn't disable all of them before the dragon started a proper attack on him. So he thought. He knew he wasn't a normal player. He could disobey the rules. A normal player would have to disable all of the cubes. But was there an alternative?

The dragon flew like an arrow towards him, and he jumped onto it. He was now sat back-to-front on the back of a giant dragon which had no idea about the laws of physics. George grabbed its wings. He found that if he pushed or pulled them, he could direct it. He smiled.

First he tried flying a very long way away, in the hope that there would be no more pillars. But they seemed to go on forever.

Next he tried flying it into the void beneath the platform. This did not seem to bother it, but it certainly bothered him, so he stopped that.

Finally he flew low and looked directly at some of the tall black things. They looked at him angrily. One of them teleported to him and tried to attack him, but ended io attacking the dragon. This was a good plan. The dragon recharged before George could stop it. He looked at as many of the things as he could. With hundreds attacking it, there was no way it could recharge quick enough. It was not long before he felt the stamina completely go.

He fell to the floor. This hurt a little, even in his immortal state. The dragon exploded in a spectacular show of purple light. All of the things lost interest in him and looked at the explosion. Another portal had appeared in the floor beneath the explosion. George escaped through it.

He had hoped that this would be like a final boss. He had hoped that he could go home now. He was right, but only on one of those. He woke up in a minecart, being pushed along by another one with an engine in it. He was handcuffed to it, and his legs were tied together. He was in the hell place, with the magma, and where the canopy used to be. "Help!" he cried uselessly. The tracks led to a huge dome made of iron. He was sent inside. He travelled past rooms filled with strange things like machines that created darkness; rooms of sad children, perhaps slaves; rooms of these slaves working, and dying. This was a miserable place. The track turned, into a room. This room had an ancient man fixed to a huge machine.

"George," he whispered.

"Yes?"

The man plummeted to the floor as the machine ejected him. He was taken away by someone who dragged him through a hatch in the wall. George, distracted, was grabbed by huge claws hanging from the ceiling. He was shoved into the socket on the machine where the old man had been before. Metal bars snapped over him to keep him in place. Blasts of electricity shot through him, and he screamed in torment and agony. His hands clenched and unclenched, his head nodded and shook like bolt of lightning, his legs kicked out and smashed into the other leg. All of these actions were not under Georges control. He had no authority over even his own body anymore. A woman stood at the bottom of the room.

"HEEELPP!" screamed George.

"Congratulations." said the woman calmly. "You've just become the new heart of the Nether. You will work here for the rest of your tiny life. I hope enjoy yourself."

The woman walked of with a sadistic smile, to the music of tormented screaming.

Millions of Java files regenerated. There was a fresh Heart. But was it really worth it?


	6. Herobrine's Origins

A Hero's Sadness

or, Herobrine's Origins

By: Jesonomi

Part 1

I simply appear. Nothing flashy. No building, no lights, not a single thing out of the ordinary. Just a respawn. This makes six deaths now. I start to trudge home when I remind mind myself that night is still out. Along with the dangers it brings. I walk fast. A decent pace and more quiet than running.

TWANG!

An arrow impales itself into a nearby tree. No! Why now? I would sprint away from the skeleton but it stands in the direct path to my house.

TWANG!

No time to think. I run at a diagonal route, taking me dangerously near the skeleton. Still, I need to get home. If I had looked, I would have seen the skeleton with an arrow ready in its bow. Waiting. A detour would waste too much time and I sprint with all I have. An arrow flies through the darkness.

There isn't the sound of the arrow hitting a wall or the ground. It sunk its tip into my thigh. I let out a cry, refusing to die silently. The abomination walks closer, smiling at me with its eternal grin. The moonlight reflects off of the bones, making them seem to glow. I start to black out from the pain when something happens. Only parts are seen from my pain-induced state. An arrow ready to be released to end my life. An arrow in flight. The bow knocked to the ground. A dagger drawn but broken by a shining sword. And then the skeleton falls in front of me, still grinning that smile as it fades away.

A hand appears in front of my face. I look up to see its owner. A strong man with eyes filled with bravery. I pale in comparison. His hair is rough and it is blown by the cold, snowy winds. Stubble covers his chin. I take his hand and struggle up.

"You just respawn? Here, take my sword." He speaks briskly, wasting no time, and goes right to the situation at hand. I take the sword and glance at it. It's shiny, iron perhaps? I was always killed after I found iron ores. Then I realize that he is still waiting for my answer.

"Yeah, I got killed by one of those green things. My house is in the west but that skeleton got in my way." My voice is shaky from both pain and fear.

"A Creeper, eh? Yeah, those things can really sneak up on you. We'd better get to your house so we can fix up your leg. I don't want to get ambushed." He hoists my arm in his shoulder. The pain is relieved, if only slightly.

We make it back to my house without any events. I wince both from pain and embarrassment as he looks at it.

"Not bad." I would sigh if he wasn't so close. We get inside and I have to sit down to avoid my knees buckling out from under me. Through some very painful procedures and plenty of screaming, he manages to get the arrow out. He tells me to rest and I manage to fall asleep through all of the pain.

Part 2

I walk back toward our house. It's been a few months since I was saved by Darien. It had been years since I had anyone to tell my name.

"Darien? Nice name. Mine's Bryan."

He's taught me all I need to know and more. Our environment, our food sources, our tools, and our enemies. I readjust my grip on the bag of logs. We go out to harvest wood every once in a while. I'm about to turn the corner of the mountain to our home when I hear voices. Foreign voices. I take a few steps back and gingerly place down the logs. Then I sneak back to the corner and peek around it. Five people in cloaks. Huddled in a circle, discussing something. I can see points poking out of their cloaks. Swords.

"Hey Bryan! You done harvesting trees? Where are you?" No! Darien rounds the corner, shouting for me. Unaware. He's smiling but it drops as quickly as rain when he sees the five people. They quickly arrange themselves in a line and draw their swords in a casual position. Little effort needed to switch between offense and defense.

"Darien of Parchejix, I presume?" The one in the middle speaks in a raspy voice.

"You cannot presume anything, you filth." Darien answers in a cold tone that surprises me. I've never heard him talk like this.

"Arrogant words from a man WHO IS DEAD." Darien's eyes narrow and he tries to leap forward to avoid it. The sword from behind still catches him. I can see the blade emerge from his stomach. No. No! NO!

I burst out from hiding. The feet of the first person are swept out from under him. The second receives a kick to the chest. The one who attacked Darien rushes over to help them. I intercept his strike and rip the sword from his grasp. I hear some things break.

The sword goes into a slashing frenzy. I manage to calm myself down to the point of control. Only one person remains, his cloak splattered with the blood of his allies. I raise to sword to finish him when he quickly sprouts out words.

"Wait! Um!...Bryan! We were simply hired! We have no personal grudge!"

"WHO? WHO HIRED YOU?" My voice is unrecognizable, taken over by rage.

"We, I don't know! We got a letter with gold! Here! Take the gold and letter! Please spare me!" He withdraws a package from his cloak and throws it at my feet. I kill him. The anger is finally spent and I run over to Darien. Tears start streaming as I see the blood lost. He manages a smile and weakly wipes some tears from my face.

"Look at you...All grown up...I thought I told you that crying makes you vulnerable."

"No...No, no, no, no. You'll survive. I'll...find a way." I manage to choke out the words in intervals.

"No...This is the end...My spawn is very far from here...I don't think that I can make it back here...Just...Just do one favor...For me." His voice is getting quieter and the pauses between his words are longer.

"Anything." I can just make out his face through my tears as he gives me his final request.

"Make me a grave...Remember Bryan, you are a hero to me." Our positions are switched. Instead, he is the one looking up to me. But I can't save him. His hand goes limp in mine and I cry harder. Time passes. Seconds. Minutes. Hours. I compose myself and get a shovel from the building. It's no longer a house. It's no longer ours, nor is it mine. It contains memories that I can no longer feel happy recalling. A hole gets dug and I gently place his body into it. I fill it up and step back to look. It isn't a grave. No landmark. I take some nearby soil and make a small pyramid. It's the best I can do in this wrecked condition.

I remember the package. Walk over to it. Pick up. Break seals. Find paper. Unfold. Read.

Hello Brotherhood. I expect that you will be groveling over the gold that comes with this letter. I will give tenfold more of it if you killed Darien of Parchejix. He is located at the nearby mountain in the south. Look for a house built into it. Kill him and bring proof of his death. Give it to the messenger and you will receive you gold. Do not fail or you will face the consequences.

~ T.P.Z

Brotherhood and T.P.Z. Two names. I will avenge Darien. I will hunt them down and they will die at my hands.

Part 3

Many Brotherhood members die at my hands. I don't even know who T.P.Z. is. My thirst for their blood only grows. I find them with tidbits of information, eavesdropping on conversations, hearing rumors, and other things. All while being invisible. No, I am not truly impossible to see. I do not disappear. Instead, I block myself from society. Nobody knows me. Nobody recognizes me. Even if they do notice, they see only a visiting wanderer. Essentially, to people, I am invisible. A nobody.

But I suppose that brought my downfall. Slowly, my life of "Search and Kill" takes its toll on my humanity. I detach from my body. My reason, avenging Darien, fades away and dies along with my memories. I only have two purposes for my existence. Find T.P.Z. and Brotherhood members. Slaughter them. Painfully. I notice the toll on my mind but do nothing. Day by day, I fade further from society, truly becoming invisible to all. Week by week, I show less rage, or anything, while killing units of Brotherhood. Blood no longer has meaning. Just a wipe, and it's gone from my face, or wherever it is. Month by month, I blank out more often, and wake up in a completely different place. There is always a pyramid next to me. And then, year by year, my conscious fades as well. Everything that makes me humane starts to tear away from my body.

I try to prevent it but I can only slow it down. One of Darien's lessons come back to me. "Make the most out of life. That way, you won't regret anything." It's too late to avoid regret but I can at least have a personal win at the end of my life. Recall memories. Bear the pain, remember the joy and perhaps keep my identity. I start leaving a sort of calling card when I kill Brotherhood people. It's nothing much. Just to let them know who they are dealing with.

I am the Hero Bryan. I will find you. You will feel Darien's pain. Start regretting your life and pray.

But there is a problem with that. I don't truly believe in it. Do I believe in it? Am I truly a Hero? No. I don't think that it's true at all. But it's all I have left from my life. Fate didn't want anything from my life. When I found out, I died for the seventh and final time.

Herobrine.

One second, I charge into battle, screaming, "The Hero Bryan will have his revenge on all of you!" The next, I hear rumors in town about Herobrine. Brotherhood fighters scream that name as they flee. The only connection I had to this world was butchered. Everything I have shatters into pieces.

"Remember Bryan, you are a hero to me."

My mind, my spirit, and my soul all cut their lines away from reality. I float aimlessly in space, a void of blue that stretches on forever.

Who am I really? Bryan? Not anymore. A hero? I never was. The Hero Bryan? A grasp at reality. Herobrine? Maybe I am now.

Two blobs of something rise up so that they have me in the middle. I glance at them for a second with a sad, tired look. I look away. They close the gap between them, encompassing me. Well. This is it.

But fate refuses to let me rest with Death. I'm dragged through space and time. The first thing I see is the clock tower. I'm back at the town where I heard of Herobrine. Then I see that I am in the air. I'm suspended there. I look down to see the cause but then see the flames.

What's going on? My being responds and I swoop down to the person who caused it all. Me. My body of flesh and bone. It. Him. Arrows are spread everywhere yet I see no blood on their tips. I see blood on his hands. A sword glints in the sky, a mix of iron, gold, and diamond. A teenage boy runs up with it in hand. He brings it down with skill and power but it merely passes through my body. What! I thought that my body was made of flesh and bone but it seems that it has exceeded physical existence. It's an entity now.

My entity, the entity...is simply "It". It turns its head and I scream both to myself and to the adolescent boy. My screams echo in my mind. I have no effect in the real world. NO! RUN! GET OUT OF THERE! WHAT ARE YOU DOING?

Humanity no longer exists in that shell of my body. The pupils have completely disappeared, eaten by the insanity that has planted itself there. A blank expression has replaced my usual frown. The teenager whimpers and falls down. A puddle is formed from his urine. Then his blood joins it. His beating heart is in the hand of the entity. The sword is gone, thrown somewhere unknown. And then, as if bored of this chaos, my body runs off. It's a leisure run, not a sprint of hurry. I follow from above.

He continues to run. I continue to follow. He stops, I do as well. He scares explorers, sometimes killing them, and I watch in pain and sorrow. That is what I do now. Look at my body bringing death and fear to all. This is the result of my hate. Do not take the same fate as I did. Avoid it at any cost. I hope that you never meet me or my body. We are both monsters.

THE END


	7. Notch's Pen

Notch's Pen By:FailMineman

**NOTE: THE "CHAPTERS" IN THIS STORY ARE JUST HOW FAIL WROTE THE STORY OUT… PAY THEM NO HEED.**

Prologue

A Nice Beginning

The whole minecraft world you're in... It was drawn, by a well known god. Notch. He first summoned a pen to draw an entire world. Once he was done, he drew trees to provide shade for the life he was about to draw. He started out with pigs. Later came cows, then sheep. Then, he figured some life should not be as nice as sheep... or pigs. So he drew the spider. Still he wanted less nice life... or death. So at night he made Zombies... then the Skeleton. Next, he felt like a little destructive, so he decided to draw the creeper. However, he felt it still wasn't complete. He got the idea after seeing a Zombie. Maybe a living version of the zombie, so he drew the person that this very story is about. He drew Steve...

Chapter 1

Smooth Sailing

Steve got to work almost instantly. Notch was impressed at how hard Steve worked. In about an hour, Steve had a house up. Notch was so impressed, he thought, "What would happen with two people?". So he drew another person. However, He screwed up and made a woman. Or at least he thought he screwed up. While Steve was working, he accidentally made paper, so he decided to make a journal to record day to day events.

(Day 1)

I have just got my shelter up and hopefully soon I can... what was that. I just heard a rustle in the bush about 20 feet over to the right... there it is again. Oh my Notch, I must be hearing things...

Steve investigated the source of the noise to find Jessie, the female Notch drew. She thought a way to get Steve's trust was to give him something. So, she handed him a hollowed out log. Steve told Jessie, "It's cool, I do need armor... Thanks." He strapped the log to his back and Jessie laughed. Steve wondered why she was laughing so he asked her why. She said he looks funny and that now he's the shelled wonder. Steve chuckled. Steve decided to make a house on water.

For Jessie, as a thank you gift. While working, Steve fell backward into the water. Jessie immediately went to help Steve, only to find he wasn't wet, he was floating. The straps broke and Steve had an idea after he saw himself. Maybe, he could catch the mysterious creature going through the water, for food. Jessie loved the idea because, well, she was hungry. A few hours later, Steve finished the house on the water for Jessie, made fried fish and ate.

Chapter 2

Darkness Hurts

"So Jessie, do you like your house?"

"Yes"

"I knew, I was a good builder."

Steve decided to make a pit around his house for protection.

"So... Steve, won't we need light to see?"

"Oh crap!"

"What, did you fall into your pit?"

No response.

"Steve, you're worrying me... Steve?"

Jessie went to Steve's Pit only to find him hurt. He was knocked out. Notch was amazed to see that things can happen to people when they fall. Jessie was scared shit-less. So Notch helped out and revived Steve. When Steve got up, Jessie was happy that Steve was o.k. Steve got back to work, but he made sure he didn't fall... again. When Steve was almost done, he found a black mineral; he realized what he had found, so he made many torches to keep his, and Jessie's, houses lit up. But, after that he realized that his hands were EXTREMELY sore. He had some wood and stone left over, so he made a pick.

He eventually finished the moat-ish thing.

"Well, my hands still hurt."

"Quit your... FWANGGGG!"

"OH CRAP!"

"SKELETON!"

Steve had used his pick to smash the skull of the Skeleton.

"Yeah, maybe we should go to our houses."

"Jess, have I ever told you that you have good ideas."

Chapter 3

A Girls Best Friend... and her worst enemy

Notch thought that there should be harder thing in the world then stone, so he drew iron, diamond, and gold.

"Hey, what's this?"

"What's what?"

"Jessie come here, I think you might want to see this..."

"O.k. I'm here, what do you... whoa. What is that?"

"I don't know. I'll mine it and we can experiment."

So Steve then dug up all of this mysterious ore. Jessie and Steve experimented with everything. They tried crafting. It didn't work. They tried throwing it at pig. Still no success. So as their last attempt, they smelted it. They got a mysterious bar, of a grey-ish substance.

"Jessie, this is a really hard metal. Maybe I can make picks with it."

"O.k., whatever floats your log."

"We called those boats, remember."

"Oh yeah... Well, whatever floats your boat."

Steve then crafted a pick. Its strength was unmatched by stone or wood.

"Hey what's that... in the distance?"

"EWWWWW... It looks, how do I put this, ehh, gross."

What they didn't know was that they saw a creeper. To them it looked like a... I think you know.

"SSSSSSSSSSSSSSS"

"OH MY GOD!"

BOOOOOM

"Steve where are you..."

"Over there... over... there... and... up there."

"Steve where are your legs..."

"..."

Notch was saddened by Steve's death. Jessie was absolutely horrified. I mean, what if you saw your best friend without any legs and not breathing. Jessie took Steve's old iron pick and went mining for a suitable place to bury him. The whole time not talked about in this book, Steve told Jessie how he wanted to explore caves and find new things. However she didn't expect to find diamonds... and lava. She thought the diamonds were pretty, so she buried Steve in the rock right next to the diamonds... and took one for herself.

Chapter 4

Could It Be?

5 months after Steve's death, Jessie has found other people in the Mysterious world that Notch created. They have a thriving city with Jessie as the queen. However, Jessie has changed a lot; she is now very depressed and prefers to be alone. She also carved the diamond into the shape of a heart and placed it on Steve's grave.

"Jessie! Jessie, there appears to be a newcomer and he says he knows you!"

"WHAT! Andy did you say he said he knows me?"

"Yes, you need to come follow me!"

"OK lead the way."

Andy then took Jessie to find the "Newcomer". She knew it wasn't Steve, from the clothes, but the voice. It sounded like Steve.

"I must be going insane. I miss him, but, I will be getting married soon. Should I call off the..."

"Call off the what?"

"Nothing Andy!"

"OK, shout if you need me."

"Yes, I shall, I can't marry Andy. I need Steve. But he's dead."

Notch saw that the city was bustling with business of the "Newcomer". He thought "What if that is Steve? Could it be? No, it can't. It could though."

The "Newcomer" couldn't remember anything, but the fact he knew Jessie, and breathing and all that basic stuff.

"Steve?"

"Who, what? Are you talking to me?"

Chapter 5

New Invention

Another 5 years passed since the arrival of the "Newcomer". He liked the nickname so he kept being called the Newcomer. He rose in ranks after basic training as a knight, now he is the General of the Army in Queen Jessie's city. But all of kindness is about to be abruptly stopped.

"Queen, Queen!"

"What Andy?"

"Our miners have discovered a new material. It's hard as about diamond. Maybe harder."

"Harder? Nothing is harder than diamond."

Andy took Jessie to the mines to show her the new material. They dubbed it obsidian. People got ideas that obsidian was a holy material. So they built an alter made of obsidian. After they finished building, they celebrated with a bon fire. The fire reached the alter and created a portal. They sent a man through... he never came back.

Chapter 6

We Won't Wait Anymore

"Jessie, you're being drastic!"

"No, I must find Steve."

Notch has been keeping in touch with Jessie and told her that Steve was through the portal. The portal was to the nether; the area Notch had not only recently drew, but sends all living things that die. He had told her that Steve was through the portal. Jessie had chosen her most elite warriors, for Notch had told her that the nether was EXTREMELY dangerous.

"ONWARD!"

"By your word, Queen Jessie."

As soon as they went through the portal, it was a hell... no really, it was a hell. The zombie pigmen were friendly, enough. They told in the pigmen language, which the humans understood, because on earth the humans and pigmen were friends, but that doesn't matter. The pigmen told of how to defeat the ghasts, which right out of the portal killed 3 people.

BOOM!

"PIAGRONS!" *Pigmen language for GHASTS!*

"ALL OF YOU HEAD OUT I'LL KILL THEM! AHHHHHHHHHH!"

"FOLLOW ME MEN!"

The battle was won by Jessie; sadly she had to blow herself up as well. Jessie's soldiers had found the man they sent through 3 weeks ago. He was injured, but not dead. The pigmen and Soldiers carried Jessie's body out of the nether. She was buried next to Steve, they were forever together.

Chapter 7

The Battle of Hell and Earth

All hell broke loose after Jessie's death, suicide went up 9000%. The Ghasts used the souls to become sentient, and later attacked earth. The numbers out of the portal were in hundreds.

"GAHHHH!"

"FIGHT HARDER! FIGHT TO YOUR LAST BREATH!"

"MIA GRON FRO ZONBS!* NEVER GIVE UP PIGMEN!*"

After several hours of fighting, with the help of Notch and his pen. The humans prevailed. But, the war didn't end there. Creepers of the tens of thousands attacked the survivors. Notch, however managed to capture the souls of Jessie and Steve. He put them back on earth, with full diamond armor and weapons. However that wasn't enough to win.

Jessie got hit by a Creeper explosion, and died. Steve fell into a crater made by Ghast fireballs and Creeper explosions, he too, had died. Soon the earth was claimed by evil. Notch and all dead humans and pigmen, launched an assault on the nether. They were going to plant a bomb. One that, not only destroys the planet, but all living on it. They had got the bomb planted. Notch got them out. The planet went boom. Notch, with all of the help of the souls, created a paradise for all good souls. Jessie, Steve, and Notch ruled for all eternity.

THE END

Moral: Never summon a pen to create a planet that you will most likely destroy.


End file.
